


Of feathers and skin

by Gavranica



Category: Maleficent (Disney Movies)
Genre: 14 and 15, Also tickling, Arguing, Blood Loss, Broken Bones, Dragons, E for chapters 8, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Family Drama, Feathers plucked, First Kiss, Gen, Grieving, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, Imprint raven, Mild Language, Nest sharing, Nightmares, Sexual Frustration, Sort Of, Tickling, Wedding Rings, Wet & Messy, Why Did I Write This?, but not so innocent
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:13:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 84,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26550445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gavranica/pseuds/Gavranica
Summary: Touching is different for ravens and humans. Diaval learns, and as his unusual unkindness grows, they learn too.
Relationships: Aurora & Diaval (Disney), Aurora & Maleficent (Disney), Aurora & Phillip (Disney), Aurora/Phillip (Disney), Diaval & Maleficent (Disney), Diaval/Maleficent (Disney)
Comments: 208
Kudos: 256





	1. A cut too deep

“Make yourself useful, Diaval, she said. This is a task even a bird could perform, Diaval, she said”, he grunted through clenched teeth, fumbling with a small copper knife and a handful of roughly chopped willow bark. 

  
He observed his handiwork which was currently splayed all over the large stone slab. Even if he hadn’t been stranded in this dreadful human form, he would still be able to tell that he had done a miserably poor job out of cutting that bark.

  
“Well, she had obviously been spending woefully little time around birds”, he continued muttering to himself, cocking his head, assessing the possible alternate approach to the predicament in which he had found himself in.

  
The mistress had instructed him to cut the cursed thing into very, very small pieces - “half - inch” was her exact wording – and while he wasn’t exactly certain that he knew how much a half - inch was, he could bet his tail that it was much smaller than what he had managed to achieve. The bark was torn, rather than finely cut, into several shreds the size of his palms. And he had spent a good deal of time making that little progress.

  
Which was an expected outcome from someone who had never held a knife, or had ever cut anything in his short, avian life.

  
He eyed the general direction of his mistresses' abode in the dilapidated castle remains. She had withdrawn there quite some time ago, and he expected her to come out any moment now. And when she does, she will see how utterly incompetent he actually is, and what she will do then, he had very little idea of. He had known her only for a few days, and while she had never hurt him so far, her disposition wasn’t exactly one of a scintillating kind.

  
Slightly panicking, he switched the small blade from one clumsy palm to another. He had stated sweating – really, just how disgusting this human body could possibly get? - and his scalp started itching where his feathers were growing among the hair. By habit and reflex, his knee jerked out in an attempt to scratch his head with his foot, before he remembered that it’s an anatomical impossibility in his current form. Irritably, his hand went to his head, and then he realized he was still holding a knife in that hand, and that he had just came close to cutting off a piece of his scalp. 

  
The knife clattered on the stone when he dropped it and scratched his head, then his chest, then his arms and legs. His entire skin felt overstretched, too tight, and the dampness of his sweat-soaked clothing was repulsive to him. Impulsively, he tugged at his coat and peeled it off his shoulders, and felt an instant relief at the sensation of a cool breeze against his back, now covered only in a very loose shirt. 

  
_Ah, that’s much better._

  
Biting the inside of his cheek (those damn teeth seemed to purposefully get in the way of his cheeks and tongue), he gripped the blade, determined to prove himself worthy of the trust he’d been given. His hair was falling in his face, irritating him to no end.

  
Holding the knife in his left hand and a piece of the willow bark in his right, he started pressing the blade in what seemed to be the fine place to make a cut, but he cut too close to the edge. Instead of getting a clean-cut piece, he managed only to squish the woody tissue. Losing patience, he forced the blade in the bark, but when he pressed too hard, the knife slipped on the stone and slashed the side of his right palm, just below his thumb.

  
Diaval let out a yelp, more out of surprise and frustration than out of pain, and cursed profusely as dark blood started to ooze out of the wound and dripped on the stone. He blinked owlishly at the small, but steadily bleeding wound, and a horrifying thought occurred to him: what if this seemingly small wound, insignificant to a man, turns out to be a debilitating injury to his raven wing?

  
He picked up his discarded coat from the ground and resumed his silent stream of profanities, holding the coat sleeve to his hand to stop the bleeding. His eyes darted wildly left and right for any sign of a predator which might get a whiff of his blood. Every instinct of his, every unconscious impulse and every lesson learned from his elders urged him to flee instantly, to find a shelter at the highest altitude possible and hide away at least until the wound closes up, and preferably until it heals completely. But he didn’t have his wings at the moment, and the best thing he could possibly do in his ground-ridden state was to crouch low to the ground, sink behind the stone, and silent himself. He caught a movement in the sky; a soaring bird, two miles away, maybe less; could be a fellow raven, but could be a hawk, too, and it was risky to assume anything. His heart started to race, and just when he started contemplating if darting for his mistresses’ shelter would be a good idea – his raven self screaming yes, yes, yes, while his newfound human consciousness resolutely yelled no, absolutely no, she would detest such weakness – a voice behind his back said: “You do realize that you are much bigger than it at the moment, don’t you?”

  
The sudden intrusion made him jump from his crouching position, but instead of finding his footing easily, he overbalanced and staggered forward, only to find himself staring at the sour look of distaste on Maleficent’s face. 

  
“How come you are so pathetic at being a human in every aspect, except when it comes to the irritating habit of talking?” she chided. “No hawk, eagle or owl is a threat to you in this form. Did you ever see a hawk flying away with a man in his talons?”

  
Diaval felt heat rising to his cheeks. Again, he felt his strange new body starting to grow too warm, for reasons unknown. Strangely, he found it difficult to look his mistress in the eyes.

  
“And I see you managed to achieve absolutely nothing here”, she eyed the mess he made with the willow bark. “One would think that something so simple would...” 

  
Alarmed with the way her voice trailed away, Diaval was once again torn between running for his life and standing his ground for anything that comes. He decided for the latter. 

  
“Is this _blood_?”

  
His cheeks and ears were definitely on fire by now. There was no other explanation for the burning sensation he was experiencing.

  
“I’ll clean it up”, he said, forcing himself to look at Maleficent’s face and straighten himself to his full height, even if he had rarely felt this small and unsightly in his life. 

  
“Show me”, Maleficent swiftly extended one impatient hand towards him, leaning heavily on her staff with another. Before his mind could catch up with his instincts, Diaval shied away from her sudden gesture, and immediately regretted the display of fear. Now she was going to detest him even more.

  
But surprisingly, the expected anger didn’t come. Instead, she pulled away her hand slightly, but not entirely, and the expression of her eyes changed, though Diaval couldn’t guess what the change meant. 

  
“Diaval”, she said, quietly and evenly. “I am not a human, though I may look similar to one. I assure you; I do not eat birds.” an almost imperceptible smile tugged at her lips. “Though I sometimes do indulge in some eggs.”

  
“That’s a relief”, he answered, with voice sharper than he wanted it to be. He sometimes indulged in some eggs, too, especially those of the water birds, he thought, but didn’t say it. The silliest mental image came to him: Maleficent and he, in his true form, robbing the duck nests and sharing the spoils in the nest large enough to accommodate them both.

  
Silly thought. As if she would ever do something so unbecoming of her to share a nest with him. Or food. Or time.

  
“Well, show me where you managed to cut yourself, then.” She held her hand outstretched. “I am not going to bite. What use would I have of a damaged wing?”

  
Acknowledging her logic, he reluctantly pulled out his injured hand from where he’d been clutching it and presented it to Maleficent. The unease was making his skin crawl, though. Exposing an injury like this was going against every self-preservative fiber he had in his body. 

  
She felt this, obviously, even though he had tried to hide it to the best of his abilities. The best of his abilities, however, meant standing stiff as a rod, casting sideway glances which darted between her eyes, her hand, and his reluctantly offered appendage. To his surprise, she pulled her hand away, and he felt stupid, standing with his injured hand outstretched, so he clutched it protectively again.

  
“Birds don’t like being touched, do they?” she drawled. This was not a question, even if it was phrased like one. 

  
“Not particularly, mistress.”

  
“Do you trust me?”

  
Not certain what the correct answer was, he opted for an honest one. “Not particularly, mistress.” he tried to smile, though it felt more like a grimace. 

  
She seemed to be amused by this. “Ah, I suppose you are not bound to. You offered your service, not your trust. Are you having second thoughts about it?”

  
“Not at all, mistress."

  
“Even if your service includes dealing with deadly daggers, as is now the case?” Yes, she was definitely smiling. And making fun of him. He didn’t know if he should feel relieved or offended.

  
“Even the deadly daggers”, he nodded.

  
She beckoned him to come closer, and he did. She opened her palm for him, much slower than the first time, and he carefully offered his bloodied hand again. But she wasn’t quick to take it. Instead, she said: “Well, I must say you seem to be better at spying than at using your hands, and that is what matters the most.”

  
To hide his unease at her slowly approaching hand, he begun to talk: “If I may speak freely, mistress, considered that I never held a knife before in my life, I would say I could have done worse. And look at the damage it did to my wing. What if my flight feathers are cut off? It might take weeks to heal. It might even scar. Not that I mind scars. I have quite a collection already. What’s another little dent on a skin? But growing a flight feather back, it’s an arduous thing. It’s demanding on a bird. Oh, look how deep it is. And it’s still bleeding. That is going to take forever to heal. And -” 

  
“Diaval”, she interrupted his stream of thoughts, voice even. “it’s only a small cut. I dare say you will likely live to see another day.”

  
“Oh, it might look like a small cut to you, at the moment, maybe, but it’s one cut too deep, if you ask me, and what about when you shift me to my - “

  
The sensation of her hand gently taking hold of his own shut him up effectively.

  
It was unlike any other touch he had ever experienced. It felt closer to the skin, somehow; warmer and more real, her palm and fingertips ghosting over the back of his hand, and making the small hairs on his arm stand. The sensation spread further, up his arm and in his chest and settled in his belly, and he couldn’t suppress a shiver that ran through his entire body. 

  
_Not a terrible feeling at all,_ he thought, and wondered if the intensity of it had to do something with the fact that he had never been touched by another living being while in his human shape before. Or with the fact that his human skin was featherless, bare, and felt more acutely than his feathered one (in which case, he was ready to forgive this ungainly human body all of the nasty peculiarities which it brought onto his person. He will know this if she ever touches him in his true form). Or was this how her touch, and hers only, felt to anyone she would bless it with? Or was it a fairy thing?

  
“All the fuss...” he could hear her murmuring, and was astounded when whisps of golden magic surrounded their hands, and the nice feeling intensified tenfold. Before his eyes, the gaping, deep cut closed itself, wound knitting to form a scab, then a red scar which paled into light pink – a process of several weeks unwinding within moments. 

  
She let go of his hand as soon as the scar went pale – not without a regret on his part – and he gaped at his hand as if he was seeing it for the first time. Though, granted, he hadn’t seen it more than a dozen times by that point, and every time he would pay some attention to his human body, he would find something to wonder about. This time, however, he was wondering about the power of the fairy to whom he had pledged his life. Why was he surprised at all? A creature which had the kind of power that could turn a bird into a man could certainly heal any wound. 

  
He turned to look at her in awe, and found her smiling ever so slightly, so enigmatically.

  
“Close your mouth”, she instructed. “You’ll catch flies.”

  
He grinned hopefully. He was hungry. “Really?”

  
She sighed in exasperation.

  
“Apparently I have to teach you the basics”, she beckoned him to the stone he had used as a cutting surface. He followed, rubbing his now- healed hand, still mystified. “Now, are you left-handed?”

  
He tilted his head to the side.

  
“Do you use your left hand to do most things, or your right one?” 

  
“I normally don’t use hands at all, because I normally don’t have them.”

  
She pinched the bridge of her nose, and closed her eyes.

  
“Does your head hurt?” he asked, worried that she might have somehow been harmed in the process of healing him. He would hate that. He might not trust her entirely just yet, but she hadn’t done him any wrong so far; quite the opposite.

  
“Just a little”, came a gravely reply. From her robes she produced a small apple, and he watched with interest what was she going to do with it. 

  
“Hungry, Diaval?”

  
“Always”, he grinned.

  
“Good. Catch!”, and suddenly she threw the apple at him with surprising speed for someone who moved so slowly and painfully. He yelped in surprise and caught the fruit before it could collide with his nose. 

  
“Nice catch”, she gave another not – quite – smile. “Right- handed it is. Why on Earth did you hold a knife in your left hand, then? Come here and bring that apple. Oh, don’t look at me like that. You will get to eat it.”

  
She picked the knife in her right hand and showed him how to secure it between his thumb and index finger. “Now, put that apple here, and hold it with your other hand. No, see, your finger is in the way, and if you cut it off, you should know that I cannot grow back the missing parts.”

  
Her voice changed the cadence only slightly, went just a bit deeper, colder, but Diaval caught that. She hadn’t confided in him, not yet, but he knew what happened – all living things around the Moors knew – and he knew just how recent it had been, because he had seen her, he had come to her to this exact place, weeks ago, when they first met. He had heard her quiet sobs, and the curiosity had gotten the better of him. And he approached her, this anguished stranger, not understanding the facts, but knowing that she was in distress, that she was wounded, and wondering if he could perhaps help, if only to keep watch. She had banished him then, though, only to find him days later in the predicament of his own. He wondered if she knew that he was that same bird at all. He wondered if she ever asked herself what he thought of her, that night in these ruins. He wondered if it had been an accident that she just stumbled upon him and his captors that day in the field, or was she following him?  
He shook his head. Stupid thoughts. She wouldn’t care what he thought of her. Why would she? And of course she would have had better things to do with her time than following a single, nondescript raven around. It was a pure coincidence, a sheer luck on his part.

  
“Are you listening to me?” she snapped.

  
“Sorry, mistress.”

  
“I told you to bring the knife closer to the other hand, but not too close – like this - “  
And she covered his hand with her own and nudged it in the right direction.

  
“And now, slide the blade, forth and back, like this – Diaval, hold the apple with your other hand; you can’t have it rolling.”

  
He had some trouble focusing on the task at his hands, when he was once again overcome with the feeling of her skin against his own. The way the skin of her palm moved against the back of his hand was firing a new set of goosebumps over his arm. Her hands were small, slender, and looked so fragile; yet they held such power, and her grip had a strength to match. But he didn’t feel threatened by it. He felt guided; protected, even. He wanted to be able to protect her, too. 

  
“...and there. You managed to cut an apple in two. With some help. An accomplishment. How lovely”, she said with a smirk.

  
Exhilarated by the sensation of their hands moving together, and not quite appreciating her mocking tone, yet finding it strangely challenging, he replied without thinking: “Well, I just have to practice now to be as good as you. That won’t be hard, luckily.” He grinned playfully.

  
He thought he had gone too far, but she merely rose an eyebrow. “I see again you have no need of help where it comes to yammering. It must be an innate talent. Has that indomitable tongue of yours ever gotten you into a heap of trouble?”

  
“You should know I am a distinguished storyteller and a singer among my kind. If you allow, I could -”

  
“No, I do not allow!” Maleficent cut him off, an uncharacteristically alarmed expression on her face. Finding it amusing, he cackled with mirth. She stretched her lips in a fanged grin. 

  
“You are a funny bird.” she seemed to be assessing him, somehow, scrutinizing him intently. Quietly, she added: “You are a brave bird.”

  
He tried hard not to puff his chest at her praise. Especially since he couldn’t be certain that she wasn’t going to, perhaps, incinerate him, bravery and all, for his cheekiness.

  
“Eat that apple. We can cut the willow bark together.” She wrapped herself tighter in her brown robe, as if fending against the cold, and adverted her gaze. The breeze played with the locks of her brown hair, and she seemed to be getting lost in thought. 

  
Diaval took a half of the apple and eyed it from all angles. He had never attempted eating in this form. He missed his precise, sharp beak. He knew he should take a bite with those horrendous teeth he now sported, but it didn’t seem nearly as elegant as pecking. Deciding to give it a try, he sunk his teeth in the fruit, and was surprised at the effectiveness of the act. The bite he could take with them was enormous. Also, another pleasant surprise cam when he realized that the taste was much more intense for the human mouth than it was for the bird’s. As ugly and clumsy as it was, human body did have its benefits, he could tell.

  
But when he tried to swallow the morsel, he realized that he couldn’t. Not only he couldn’t swallow; he couldn’t actually take a proper breath, and when he tried to take a forceful intake of air, it only got worse, and needed to cough, badly, but he couldn’t because the air couldn’t go in or out and he went blind with panic and his chest burned - 

  
“ _Oh, for goodness’ sake!”_ Maleficent’s shrill exclamation cut through the fog he was sinking into, and he felt something striking him painfully on the back, and something hitting him in the stomach at the same time, and suddenly the sweet, sweet air filled his lungs, and then he doubled over, coughing convulsively. His eyes filled with water.

  
“ _For goodness’ sake!”_ Maleficent yelled again, sounding thoroughly distressed for the first time since their initial encounter at this place _. “You are supposed to chew what you eat, you gluttonous fool of a bird!”_

  
Diaval was vaguely aware that the apple had cleared from his airways at some point, but how exactly his mistress had achieved it, he had no idea. It only now dawned on him that he had truly almost choked to death, and he decided to lower himself – gracefully and with dignity, of course – on the ground upon that realization. He continued coughing and his eyes continued watering, but he could still make out the outlines of Maleficent’s face when she kneeled down before him and gripped both his upper arms in a vice – like grip. She looked a little mad. Her eyes were wide, blazing unnatural green, and it occurred to him that perhaps it would be better for him if he had indeed choked to death, if facing her wrath was the alternative.

  
“Are you all right?” she yelled in his face, shaking him with her both hands. “Answer me!”

  
“I...am”, he managed between the coughs. “Human...body... is... _stupid_.”

  
She was not releasing her grip on him in the slightest. Now that the watering in his eyes subsided, he could see that she was staring at him incredulously, eyes wide. He was overcome with the primal urge to cuddle against her, to lower his neck in askance of being comforted with her touch, as he would if she was a flock mate, but he knew better. She wasn’t a raven, and at the moment, neither was he. And he had been granted with her touch the third time in less than an hour. That was more he could ever hope for.

So he just breathed, in and out, coughing subsiding, and eventually, her hands released their grip on him and fell down her sides.

  
“I will have to teach you better how to use this form”, she spoke, voice gravely. Her breathing was ragged. Even her eyes, their fires now extinguishing, seemed to be glossed over. “I was reckless. And selfish. This is my fault. You might have died right here and now if I had gone inside those walls instead of standing here next to you, you could have died because of a stupid apple, and it would have been entirely my fault.”

  
He tilted his head. Despite her words, he couldn’t feel that she was to blame for his near-death experience. If anything, he was profoundly ashamed because of his recklessness. While he was searching for what to say, she leaned on her staff heavily, standing up, and her entire demeanor changed as if another soul took hold of her body. Her eyes narrowed; her back straightened; her mouth pressed together hard. Coldly, she looked down at him, and said: “And I am not looking forward to going through the trouble of training yet another obtuse bird into becoming something that could pass for a servant.”

  
“Teach me, then”, he rasped out, refusing to look away, or to be hurt by her cruel words. He rose to his wobbly legs, stubbornly staring her back. If she could give it, he could take it.

  
She fixed him with a cold glare, and took the second apple slice in her hand. 

  
“This is what most human infants know before they can walk”, she hissed. “Observe closely.”

  
Her white, sharp teeth sunk into the apple in the same manner a wolf dismembers his prey. She chewed slowly, and when she swallowed, she asked: “Did you see? You are supposed to grind it with your teeth. Front teeth for biting, rear teeth for grinding, and only then you guttle it. Do you think you will be able to understand?”

  
She waved the half-eaten apple slice right in front of his nose, and after a swift calculation of her movements’ speed and trajectory, his head snapped forward, lightning-fast, and snatched the fruit from her fingers with his teeth. She jerked her hand back, startled, and he couldn’t help but feel the satisfaction of retribution. 

  
Again, he awaited to see if he was going to be pulverized for this, and while waiting, he bit off a bit of the apple and carefully mimicked Maleficent’s chewing. If he was going to die, he might as well die happy, eating.

  
“I see that one choking incident wasn’t enough”, she snapped. “Since you are such a fast learner, I am certain you will have no difficulties cutting that cursed willow bark by yourself. Bring it inside when you are done. Do please try not to slash your throat or impale yourself on the knife. If you make me have to save or heal your sorry posterior for the third time today, I will throttle you myself.”

  
She headed for her shelter among the ruins, her staff thudding heavily on the ground. Under her cloak, the outlines of her wing stumps were subtly discernible, and despite her harsh word and her coldness, Diaval couldn’t bring himself to resent her. Quite the contrary; his heart focused on what she did, not what she said, or how she said it. She had just saved his life, again; she had healed his wound; she had showed him two important human skills; she had taken responsibility for his fate in his form until he masters the use of it; she was clearly distressed beyond words when he was in danger, and while his rational mind was telling him it could all be explained as actions necessary for practical reasons – he was of no use to her dead or injured – his heart, which he had steadfastly followed since the day he had hatched – was telling him otherwise. She wasn’t evil; she was hurt, and bitter, and angry, and betrayed, and disillusioned, and lonely, and she was sinking into darkness with every passing day in alarming speed, but she was not evil in her core. He only knew her for days, but now he could swear on it with his life.

  
“Mistress?”

  
She turned angrily. “What?”

  
“What is the willow bark for?”

  
She glared.

  
“It might be important if I learn”, he coaxed. 

  
She stared him, unblinking, like an owl. A very big, very powerful owl.

  
“Brave bird”, she repeated quietly, her face completely blank. “You are truly audacious, are you not?” 

  
He shifted his weight from one leg to another, never taking his eyes from her. Better to be safe.

  
“We have that in common”, she said, absently, looking through him rather than at him. “I might show you”, she continued. “Soon.”

  
_Soon_ , he thought, watching her disappear among the stone walls. He rubbed the new scar on his right hand. Somehow, his own touch didn’t feel nearly as good as that of his mistress. 

  
_Funny. Earlier this day, I recoiled from her touch. And now..._

  
_Soon_ , he hoped.


	2. Unfeeling

“The last time I trusted a man with my back turned, he took my wings.”

  
The sentence was spoken in an even, flat voice. No emotions seemed to be involved. It was so tightly controlled that Diaval knew she had to be boiling inside.   
“I am not a man”, he said softly. “You can always turn me to my true form, if you wish.”  
“I know that”, Maleficent said irritably. “But would be of no use of me for this task, then.”  
“I’m a resourceful bird. I’d manage”, he said, sounding as cheerful and confidant as he could make himself. In truth, he was terrified of what he would see. Terrified that he would fail. His heart was hammering.

  
The light was pouring inside the remains of the castle in which Maleficent had found a shelter. It was mid – day, and the light was unforgiving. There was a pile of clean cloth at her side, and a pot of herbal oil was next to it. 

  
The haunted look she had given him was unlike any other he had ever received from her. Her eyes were wide, glistening, looking into some unfathomable distance, through him. He was right at her side, but she was hopelessly beyond his reach.   
But he needed her to get close to him, to ground her, if they were going to do this. And they did need to do this. She wouldn’t have brought it up in the first place, she would never have asked for his help, if she hadn’t been desperate. 

  
“I trust _you_ with my life”, he said quietly, because she wasn’t saying anything, and he didn’t know what to say to ease her mind.  
“I know.” she leaned her head on the stone wall, gazing in the general direction of the Moors. “There were times when Robin would have helped me.”  
“Who is Robin?”  
“Nobody”, she said after a pause. “Nobody to me, anymore.” 

  
She was frightening him. In there several short weeks he had known her, for all her nasty attitude, occasional life threat and coldness, he had never been this frightened in her presence as he was now.   
“Mistress”, he called softly. “Please. I know – I know you are in pain. I only wish to help, as I promised. Anything you need. Remember?”  
She almost smiled at this. 

  
“Do you think I am beautiful?”

  
The question caught him off guard, and he tilted his head in surprise. Also, he had no clue what she truly wanted to hear. The last man who had told her that she was beautiful was also the one who had stolen her wings from her. The one who was responsible for her current miserable, disturbed, untethered state; for the raw pain always just behind her stoic mask of indifference.

  
“Well, mistress, I suppose you are not entirely unpleasant to the eye, for someone who is not a bird, of course”, Diaval chose a tactical approach. “Although I would advise putting a little more weight on your ribs. Your bones are showing too much. For my liking anyway. Not that there’s anything wrong with it. Not too bad altogether, though.”

  
She tilted his head back and laughed. He had never heard her laughing before. It was a musical, resonant sound; like a bird’s song, and Diaval wanted to listen to it longer, much longer than it lasted. 

  
“A clever gentleman, are you not?” she grinned wolfishly, and without hesitation, opened her light gown and let it slide down to her hips. He was startled at the sight of her small, round breasts; for some reason, they caught his eye, and he would observe them with curiosity, if he hadn’t been terrified at what was about to come. She turned her back to him, then, pulling her hair aside to grant him a full view of two brown stumps where her wings had been. The surface of the cuts was blackened, as if burned. An unhealthy redness of a swollen skin surrounded the stumps, and Diaval could say the wounds were oozing something ugly. 

  
His breath caught in his throat. His heart hammered. He might have been sickened by the sight of her body, if he hadn’t been so utterly preoccupied with her mind. He couldn’t make a mistake now, or he would lose her trust forever. One wrong word, one wrong movement, and...

  
“Do you think me ‘pleasant to the eye’ still, Diaval?” she cackled. It wasn’t a pretty or heartfelt laughter anymore; it was unhinged, slightly manic, and not like a birdsong anymore at all.   
“Well, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like the front bumps better”, he heard himself speaking. “But we can fix them just fine, so that they are no longer such a pain in your behind, mistress. Literally. Respectfully.”

  
Her manic cackling stopped abruptly. She cocked her head to turn to look at him, mouth open. He swallowed, heart hammering so hard that his ears were ringing. 

  
The silence stretched, and Diaval watched the colors changing in Maleficent’s eyes. He envisioned how she must have been when she was healthy and whole, how magnificent she must have been among the clouds, how fast and strong her wings must have carried her. He imagined her hair flowing, her laughter, like a birdsong, above everything and everyone. His eyes started to sting and his mistress seemed to became blurry, but his vision cleared when he blinked hard. His throat felt strangely constricted.

  
“Well, let’s get this done, then”, her voice suddenly became clinical, grounded. 

  
Diaval let out an enormously relieved sigh.  
 _Well done, raven, if I do say so myself_ , he congratulated himself. _And now, to the easier part_. 

  
He approached her very slowly. No feathered creature ever liked sudden movements. And there were small feathers, on the stumps and smaller yet on the skin surrounding them, scattered. Brownish and black, he could say exactly what color her wings were. 

  
“Soak the cloth in the oil”, she instructed him. “Then, wipe at the skin first, away from the wounds, and not the other way around.”

  
His hands were shaking. He willed them to be steady. Having hands was one of the rare upsides of being a human; his mistress needed him to use those hands she had given him now, and he’ll be damned if he lets her down because of some jumpy nerves of his.   
The touch of her infected skin was too warm, even through the soaked cloth. She stiffened, but didn’t make a sound. He could see the small feathers bristle at his touch, and he gently smoothed them back. But they bristled again, and her entire body was rigid. He could hear her grinding her teeth. Sweat was starting to break out on her body.

  
“Is this painful?”  
“ _No, it tickles, you idiot!”_ she howled at him, teeth bared.   
Well, he did deserve that much. Again, he applied the poultice on the skin, as gently as he could, and with a shaky finger, caressed the small feathers. The feeling of feathers under the fingertips was drastically different than anything he could experience with his bird’s beak, talons or feathered skin. It put to shame all other touches from his old life he had thought to be intense. Compared to what human hands could experience, they were merely ghosts of a sensation. Even if he closed his eyes, he could feel the outline and texture of each individual feather almost as clearly as if he was looking at it. He couldn’t help but imagine he was caressing her undamaged wings.  
Shaking off the thoughts he had no business having, he discarded the used cloth and took the clean one to apply the herbal oil to the cauterized stumps. He expected Maleficent to scream now, braced himself for that, even for the possibility of being blasted out of her shelter with a bolt of magic, but the opposite happened. She relaxed a little, her breathing now easier, even if her thin muscles were still rigidly strained over her bony frame. 

  
“No need to be so gentle now”, she said with a hoarse voice. “I have no feeling left there.”  
The matter – of - factly tone chilled him. He imagined his own wings cut off. He imagined the helplessness, the sorrow, the feeling of being shackled to the ground.   
He would likely kill himself. It would be easy to simply jump of the cliff and hope that the fall would kill him efficiently.

  
“Stop fumbling. Hurry”, she said, voice flat, unfeeling.   
“It’s done”, he whispered. “What now?”

  
She made an unsteady step backwards, not making any attempt to cover herself, still not looking at him, and dragged herself to the scrappy looking nest of twigs and dry grass. Diaval had never seen such a sorry sight of a workmanship, put together without any care or precision. He made a mental note to go in search of some wool and linen to make it at least a bit more comfortable. It looked like a place of torture, not rest. 

  
Maleficent lowered herself slowly on the uncomfortable looking thing, irritably batting away Diaval’s offered hand. A vein was bulging on her forehead. She was suffering, and Diaval was helpless.  
“If I may, mistress – “  
“You may not”, she cut him off. “Take another clean cloth, soak it and lay it over me. And then, be gone.”  
He did as she ordered, taking one last look at her mutilated, skinny back before carefully covering it. He picked up the dirty cloths and carried them away, almost tiptoeing out of her shelter. 

  
Outside, he let out an enormous sigh, trying to exhale as much of the scent of illness as he could. He allowed his hands to shake and his legs to give out under him, but then he heard his mistress calling for him again.  
Dreading that something went wrong, he stumbled back inside and found her resting in relative peace, covered with the oily cloth he had covered her with. 

  
“Are you al – _carrrr_!”   
The change caught him by surprise, and to add to the fact that he was irritated on general principle – she might at least warn him – he hated when he was interrupted mid - sentence. Speech was one of the benefits of his human form, and though he was reluctant to admit it, he relished in expressing himself.  
“Almost forgot”, Maleficent murmured, head resting on her arms.  
“ _Arrk_!” he protested, wings flapping, rising a cloud of dust.  
“Oh, come on. I turn you into a man, you complain. I turn you into a bird, you complain. Are you never satisfied, vain creature? Come here.”

  
Strutting to her side, he wished he could tell her that he wanted to stay a man for a little while longer so he could help her if she gets even more ill, or to bring her food and water, to brew more willow bark tea, but he knew that her mind was set. She didn’t want a man at her side while she sleeps. Probably never will. The fact that she trusted him with her wounds and her back turned on him was a sign of a faith in him he didn’t think possible only days ago.

  
“Closer.”

  
He stepped so close that he would step on her if he came any closer. Using his beak, he carefully pulled at her cloth where it slipped off her shoulder.

  
“Brave bird”, she whispered. “Kind bird. Too kind. You would inevitably get that soft heart of yours broken if you ventured into the world like that.” 

  
Her hand slowly crept towards him, and when he didn’t jump away, it went to his head and gently smoothed the bristled feathers there.  
He stood still as a stone so he wouldn’t startle her and chased her away. Just like she did for him, he realized. Look at us. We are taking care for one another, he thought giddily. The touch of her sharp – nailed fingertip was not entirely unlike that of a raven’s beak, but it had the precision and the tenacity that no beak could ever provide. The slow strokes made his wings drop in bliss, and every single feather on his body stood on its end.

  
“Good thing you are stranded with me”, she went on, continuing to pet his feathered cheek. “Nothing to love. Nothing to lose. No heartbreak.”

  
“ _Carrrrr_!” he protested. Hearing her speaking about herself with such disdain made something heavy set in his chest. He didn’t know how exactly he felt about his mistress just yet, but ‘nothing to love’ would be the last thing that came to mind.  
“Sssssh”, she shushed him. “So shiny. So sleek. So well-groomed.” 

  
He didn’t even have the time to puff his chest with pride at the nicest words she had told him so far, when her hand traveled from his head, down his neck and over his wings and back. It hovered there, and continued with slow, deliberate strokes over his long flight feathers, then over his back again. And it wasn’t stopping.  
He was so shocked that he didn’t even try to disguise the ecstatic shudder of his wings and the shaking of his tail under her fingertips. Then he remembered himself, remembered that Maleficent wasn’t a raven and she didn’t know, couldn’t possibly know…

  
Forcing his body go still, he watched her eyelids grow heavy. Her hand on his back was weighing him down, but she was growing so peaceful, so calm, how could he ever find the heart to shake her off? If he rebuffed her, if he shied away from her now, after they have managed to build some foundations of trust, she would be offended beyond repair. How could he explain to her, even if he had his human mouth instead of a beak, that preening of someone’s head and neck was a general nicety performed between ravens of all amicable relationships, but touching someone’s back and wings…

  
How could he ever explain to her that she was acting as if she was _courting_ him?


	3. Boundaries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone needs to teach little Aurora that animals are not toys.

The fledgling had no boundaries where it came to animals.

  
Diaval sorrowfully inspected the state of his tail feathers. Several were missing where the child’s overly enthusiastic hands took a grip on his tail and tried to pull him into an embrace.

  
In retrospect, perhaps he should have given in, should have allowed her to squish him like a rag doll in her arms, and he would have avoided this damage, but he was startled and more than a little alarmed at the possibility of being crushed under Aurora’s weight, should she decide to use him as a pillow. So, when she yanked at his tail, his most primal instincts kicked in, and he fled. The child didn’t have a mean bone in her body, she had only wanted to play and meant him no harm, but at the age of three, she possessed enough strength to seriously injure an animal of his size, and absolutely no knowledge of how to handle animals.

  
It really should have been the pixies’ job to teach her the concept of boundaries and empathy, but apparently, they saw no need to instruct the energetic toddler on such skills. He knew he expected too much from those who allowed a three-year-old child to slip away and wander around unsupervised. He had used his spying missions for educational purposes on human life, too, and he had learned soon enough that one should keep a much closer eye on a child this small.

  
And it wasn’t just about him anymore. The inquisitive, brave, independent little tyke that she was becoming, she wanted to see and feel and touch everything – including every animal that crossed her path. She meant no harm, but she had no idea that her chubby little fingers were capable of causing a decent amount of hurt at this point; that most animals, unlike her raven friend, preferred to be left alone, and that animals could and will hurt her back if provoked. 

  
Now, hidden in the crown of a tall oak, trying to preen his abused tail into some semblance of tidiness and vehemently scrapping the dried blood from where his plucked feathers used to be, he was acutely aware of three things.

  
First, Aurora was still calling for him from where he’d fled from her, sitting in the grass and tirelessly exclaiming ‘ _Pretty bird, where are you? Pretty bird, I got your feathers! Come back, let’s play more! Pretty bird!_ _Pretty bird!’_ and he was keeping an eye on her, if she decides to go into the forest searching for him.   
Second, Maleficent was hidden in the shadows some thirty feet away, looking like a moss-covered tree trunk in her brown and green outfit, perfectly still, and though he could make out her form only because he knew she was there, he knew without a doubt that she was smirking at him. She was definitely having a little bit too much fun at his expense (but he preferred it this way than her initial petty, spiteful outbursts from the very beginning of their strange alliance considering Aurora’s care, back in those days when Maleficent wouldn’t come a mile near the little girl unless absolutely necessary, and when she threatened to put Diaval in a cage if he would spend too much time around her).  
Third, he would need to be careful in his aerial maneuvers in the near future. The lack of several feathers in his tail was bound to impair his flying agility some, which meant he would need to be extra careful on his spying missions at the castle.   
Oh, and there was a fourth thing now: Aurora had gotten to her feet in pursuit of a grasshopper, and when she managed to get a hold of him, she pulled at his leg in curiosity, until she plucked it away from the insect. She looked astounded at her accomplishment. Had it been a bird, or a lizard, or a snake, or a baby wolf, she would have attempted the same thing, Diaval knew. 

  
It was getting out of hand. As much as he hated being the cause of Aurora’s discomfort, the child needed to be corrected, for her safety and the safety of the wildlife surrounding her. 

  
Oh, how he wished that those three hairbrained pixies would do this part. Maleficent could have been helpful, even from the shadows she was so fond of, but his pride didn’t allow him to ask, and she obviously wasn’t keen on intervening any time soon. His humiliation must have been a hilarity to her. 

  
He soared in the air – well, more like swayed erratically, before he caught the gist of compensating for the sudden impairment of his steering equipment – and headed for Aurora, her back turned to him. He swooped above her, brushing her hair slightly, and landed on the soft grass before her. Stiffly, he rearranged his flight feathers; his rump was aching.  
“Pretty birdie!” the fledgling beamed at him. “ _Naughty_ birdie! You runed away. You shoudenth runed away.” She wagged a reprimanding finger at him, tucking the ill – fated grasshopper in the pocket of her blue apron. “Auntie Notass is angry when I run away. No run away any more, anywhere in the world!”

  
Diaval was almost certain that the breeze had carried a sound of Maleficent’s short, stifled laughter. He actually wished he was in his man shape, so he could have a good laugh, too. It was difficult to remain angry at the little golden – haired tyke. 

  
“Auntie Notass sleeps now”, Aurora continued, with a conspirative grin. “She won’t will yell. All aunties drinked wine, all sleep. We can play forever and ever!”  
Which told Diaval he needed to be alert for the better part of the afternoon, until the three rainbow scarecrows sober up. 

  
“We can play you are my egg, and I’m mama raven! I can sit on you till you hafcf!” Aurora’s brilliant blue eyes gleamed with inspiration. Diaval’s, in turn, widened in horror. Oh, that will not do. He most certainly did not want to be sat on by anybody, including a thirty – something pounds worth of toddler; not in his bird shape, anyway. Plucked feathers were enough; he didn’t need any broken bones.

  
He swiftly bounced away and gave out a high – pitched, disapproving caw. But Aurora was oblivious to his discomfort.

  
“I’m mama raven! My egg rolled away! Naughty egg!” she chuckled and sprinted after Diaval, arms out to grab him. He hopped out of her reach again and let out another warning croak, much deeper this time, and his feathers bristled.   
She broke into a jog after him, giggling, her blonde locks jumping about her chubby face. “Naughty egg! Come back, naughty egg! Mama has to sit on you to keep you warm!”

  
It would be easy enough for him to simply flutter away and find something else for her to play with to redirect her mind; he had always done that before, when he didn’t like the game she would have on her mind at the moment. But the pain in his rump was telling him it was just an easy way out, and it would only delay the inevitable. Forcing her hand on animals was something she simply had to unlearn, and in his raven body, he had a very limited asset of abilities to show her that. 

  
The problem was, he didn’t know if he had the heart for it, and it would hurt him more than it would hurt her, even if she would never know that.

  
She was about to catch up with him, and he let her. Issuing one last warning, he spread out his wings and puffed his feathers so much that he appeared to have grown three times his size, lowered his head and opened his beak, hissing. The prickling on his neck warned him that Maleficent, alarmed at last, was ready to unfold some magic. He wondered, in a fraction of a second, whom would she strike – him or the child, or both – and how bad it would be. _Now she interferes, when we came to the point of no return,_ he thought angrily. _Where were you by now, mistress?_ Simultaneously, he hoped that she would do something, and feared of what that something would be.

  
Aurora’s little fingers closed on the edge of his left wing, roughly, pulling him as she was laughing in delight. He flapped against her, letting out an alarmed screech, one, two times, and when the child continued to misinterpret his cry of pain for a playful one, with a heavy heart he pecked at her hand, moderately hard.

  
Watching her yelp out in pain and jump away from him hurt him more than a broken wing would.   
He was still feeling Maleficent’s magic ghosting over him, tickling, but not interfering, and for the first time ever, he found the touch of it irritating rather than exciting. He wished she would either help him or leave him alone to deal with the child, as she had left him alone numerous times before, while she was still good at pretending she wasn’t intrigued by the girl. He was feeling incompetent enough without her gaze penetrating the back of his head.

  
Aurora stared at him, shocked, gripping her hand, blue eyes wide as saucers, the expression on her face that of utter disbelief and betrayal. His heart twisted in his small chest, and his resolve faltered at once. It crumbled down completely when those blue eyes brimmed with tears which promptly spilled down her cheeks, bottom lip pursed out and quivering.

  
“ _Pretty bird!!!”_ she wailed, sincerely distressed and confused. “It _hurts_!!! I love you and you made me HUUUUURT!!!”  
And she ungracefully plopped down in the grass, landing on her bottom, and proceeded to cry in earnest. 

  
At this point, Diaval would have given up both his wings just to make her stop looking at him with such devastated expression in her eyes. Had he been in his human shape, he would have been weeping along with her, too; with his options limited, he let out a miserable wail of his own and his wings drooped at his sides. He no longer cared for the damage to his tail or his wing. He didn’t care that the ruckus might awaken one of the pixies from their wine – induced afternoon nap and have them running over and kicking him over his head with a broomstick. He didn’t even care what his mistress would think of him, the pathetic image that he undoubtedly was. He only cared for the fledgling not to hate him. 

  
“You don’t love me!” Aurora lamented, clutching her hand and producing tears at the rate of an average Moorish waterfall. Diaval saw no injury there; the only thing injured was her pride, but to his despair, her trust in him as well. “You don’t love me anymore anywhere and _you are a bad biiiiiird!”_ At which point she threw herself prostrate at the ground, buried her face in the grass and continued crying. Well, screaming, really. 

  
Now Diaval was not only upset and sad; he was growing sickeningly worried. He had never seen Aurora throwing such a tantrum before. She was normally such a happy, joyous, easy – going child; to imagine her fall apart like this was unimaginable, and he started fearing that she might hurt herself, or that he had hurt her much worse than he had thought. He approached her, knowing fully well that she was completely unpredictable right now and that she might kick out and cause him more damage than before when she had done it unintentionally, but he couldn’t just sit and wait. Carefully, he nudged at her side with his head and squawked softly, missing the power of speech more than ever, and hands to hug, too. He had never hugged anybody, nor had he been hugged in his human shape, but he had seen humans do it, and the comfort, the warmth, the love was not missed on him. Still, Aurora did hug him in this form quite a lot, and if only he could get her to look at him, to see what he was trying to explain...So much about ‘ _never being blue_ ’. Stupid pixies.

  
Predictably, the child shied away and rose her face, wet with tears and snot, only enough to glance at him furiously and yell: “ _Go awaaaaaaaaaay!!!_ You made me _hurt_!!!”  
Heartbroken, he whimpered and hopped away.  
“ _Don’t goooooooo!!!”_  
He cocked his head. Now what was he supposed to do, exactly?

  
Aurora sat back on her heels, still bawling from the top of her lungs. Blades of grass were sticking to her wet, scrunched face. To Diaval’s surprise, she extended her open arms towards him.

“ _Pretty bird!”_ she cried with such sorrow and anguish in her voice that he all but launched himself in her waiting little arms. If she lashes out at him and wrings his neck in her fury, so be it. He would much rather die at the hands of a single living being that still loved him, than at the clever aim of the king’s archer. 

  
But Aurora didn’t want to hurt him. She hugged him, a little too tight for his bird bones but he wouldn’t complain now, and buried her face in his side, weeping still. 

  
“Why did you hurt me? I was loving you and playing with you and you hurt me with pointy nose! It was _meeeeeeeeeeeeeeean!!!”_

  
He wondered how much water can an average three year old child pass through their eyes and nose before they faint. Wriggling out of her embrace, he turned his rump for her to see and fanned what was left of his tail. There was still blood on it; the damage to the feather roots still oozing. In addition, he extended his left wing for her, letting it droop as if broken. He accompanied the display with a disapproving croak. He knew that the chances for a little child to catch on this wordless attempt of explanation were thin, but that was all he had. 

  
She looked at his tail as if seeing it for the first time. Her wailing subsided into sobbing. Her breath hitching with every gulp of air, she extended a hand for his tail, but he turned around and rubbed his head against her palm gently. 

  
Again, her hand went for his tail, and again Diaval offered his head instead and tried to emulate a caressing motion. 

  
_Come on, fledgling mine. Understand. No pulling. No groping. Only gentle touching_. 

  
She was still hitching with every breath, but she was becoming quieter with every moment. Her gaze was on his tail, eyes wide.

  
“I didn’t....” she stammered. “Didn’t do that. My hand ( _sob_ ) my hand did that. I tried ( _sob_ )...I tried to stop it ( _sob_ ) but I couldn’t.”

  
She wiped the snot from under her nose with her sleeve and looked hopefully at the raven. 

  
“I am good ( _sob_ ). My hand is bad ( _sob_ ). My hand”, she repeated. “All by itself. But now ( _sob_ ) I have new. New hands. They ( _sob_ ) want to be good. They ( _sob_ ) are new.”

  
Diaval tilted his head incredulously. 

  
“They are!” she insisted. The nice shadow – it took away the bad hands ( _sob, sniffle_ ) and gave me good ones. That won’t hurt noone.”

  
“ _Carrr_.”

  
“This one isn’t broken”, she shoved her pecked hand under his beak. “You poked my old one. ( _sob_ ) This one is new, you see?”

  
“ _Croak_.”

  
“I didn’t - I didn’t make you blood! I’m not a baby. Babies are stupid. I never saw a baby. But auntie Notass says they are stupid. I was stupid. My hand was stupid. I am not stupid now. Look, I’m BIG. My foots are on the ground, and my head is all the way up.” She pointed at her head to avoid any confusion.

  
“ _Tok tok tok tok.”_

  
She started rummaging for something in her apron’s pockets, and pulled out the unfortunate grasshopper in her left hand, and several of Diaval’s tail feathers in her right one. 

  
“Here, yours.” She offered Diaval a handful of his own plumage. “They won’t stay in my hair. I tried.”

  
How could a bird stay serious at the sight of a the three-year-old who had attempted to transplant a raven’s feathers in her hairline? She was clueless, the poor fledgling; how could he stay angry at her? He hopped closer and, instead of taking the offered feathers, he swiftly scooped up the grasshopper from her other hand, gobbling him up with gusto, which made Aurora laugh giddily. She extended her empty hand and caressed him on the head, gently.

  
She might as well keep the feathers. He had no use of them anymore. The fledgling was laughing with such mirth that Diaval felt like being content with her plucking every feather from his body, only to keep her laughing so sweetly.

oOo

“That was quite a dramatic show you two managed to create there”, Maleficent smirked, her fingers petting his back, hovering with each stroke over his rump, where her golden magic worked wonders for his poor tail. 

  
He had thought she wouldn’t be able to grow the new feathers there, since it was cruelly obvious that she couldn’t grow back the missing appendages, but he had overlooked the fact that the feathers, like hair or talons, were _supposed_ to fall out every now and then to be replaced with a new one. She was merely speeding up the natural process that would take place anyway, only much slower, and she was doing it remarkably well. He shifted on the moss – covered tree stump where they were sitting. The skin on his rump tingled and itched as the new feathers grew before his eyes, and his mistress was likely aware of this, because every now and then her talon – like nails would give him a heavenly pleasant scratch there. He could almost, just almost, forgive her for doing absolutely nothing to alleviate the drama between Aurora and himself.

  
He remained silent, as he did since Maleficent had coerced him into descending from the very top of an enormous poplar, where he had withdrawn himself after Aurora was safely back in the cottage with her “aunties”. For once, he hoped she leaves him as a bird, because he was, for change, not in the mood to talk to her. And so far, she did. Apparently, she decided to do the talking today.

  
“My ears were close to bleeding”, she said in that lazy, low voice of hers, which, combined with her hand on his back, made him close his eyes and purr like a kitten. “It’s a wonder those three gnats weren’t alarmed. But then again, one needs to have a functioning brain to be alarmed.”

  
Diaval lifted his wings slightly to give her fingers better access to his wingpits. 

  
“I admit, I was a bit worried that the little beast might tear you apart at one moment. And what would I do for wings, then? I almost intervened. But you handled the situation well, eventually.” she paused. “As always.”

  
He would normally swell with pride on such praise, but the rhythmic motion of Maleficent’s hand and the blissful effect of her healing magic were too much of a distraction. He had entered a somewhat trance – like state; sleepy, but not quite; unfocused at the surroundings, but very aware of the sensations on his body. Maleficent’s hand brushed his belly and lower, to the very sensitive underside of his rump, and he was stricken by how pleasant that felt. He caught himself rubbing against her hand, once or twice, his wings and tail fluttering, before his higher brain functions overrode his sensory overload and he tethered himself in a certainty of the fact that Maleficent would not take it kindly to be used as a rutting pillow, despite the fact that she was sporting an enigmatic little half – smile at the moment.

Quickly, he shook himself and hopped away, attempting to hide his unease with some vigorous preening of his brand new tail feathers.

  
“Ah, of course. My apologies”, Maleficent smirked, a gleam in ger eyes not unlike such that she had when she pranked the pixies. “I forgot. _Boundaries_.”

  
She might have been smirking now, today obviously being the day she found some peace of mind at enjoying in his predicaments, but she wouldn’t be that benevolent if he had forgotten those boundaries, if he hadn’t shied away now, if he’d called her bluff, if he had covered her with his wings, asking, offering, pleading, if she would turn him into a man, into something she would find appealing, the way he...

  
Cursed boundaries.


	4. Closer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She was Maleficent, after all, and Maleficent didn’t invite anybody in, didn’t have difficulties facing her dreams alone, didn’t enjoy caressing him as much as he enjoyed being caressed, and certainly didn’t need him getting closer to her in the night to protect her from nightmares.

Diaval’s customary sleeping spot was just outside her nesting place on the lower branches of her rowan tree, where Maleficent had grown its branches and leaves into a thick wall that closed up a space large enough for her to stand, lie down, store her valuables and occasionally pace up and down in circles. In his raven form, he would huddle up at the branch right next to the entrance, where he could hear every breath, every sigh, every choked sob and every commotion from the inside.

And there were commotions, occasionally. 

Maleficent’s dreams were often uneasy. She never spoke in her sleep, merely sighed and grind her teeth and twisted and turned. But when Diaval would peek through the leafy canopy which covered the entrance and croaked softly, or cooed, or purred soothingly, he could see her contorted face smoothen in the dim luminescence of the fairy lights, and she would settle down most of the times, and the night would continue uneventfully. 

Which was why he hadn’t expected, when he heard her sighing and shifting, and when he hopped inside to soothe her the only way he felt he was allowed to, that he would be presented with the sight of her wide open, furious, green-glowing eyes and a snarl full of sharp, bared teeth. Or that her hand would leash out so unexpectedly that even his bird reflexes weren’t fast enough to dodge it; that her fingers would clench around his throat; that the air would be squeezed out of him; that icy panic would engulf him and that, in the flurry of flying feathers, flapping wings and bursts of green magic, he would grip the arm that held him with his sharp talons and dig them in her skin.

 _"Where were you?”_ she roared, shook him hard like a rag doll, and threw him far away from her, against the wall of branches.

He sucked in the sweet, wonderful air as the colorful stars danced in front of his eyes. He slid to the floor, marginally aware of the pain in his neck, throat, back and head, but barely registering it as something to worry about at the moment. He worried about Maleficent, who thankfully didn’t charge at him again, but shrieked: _“Where were you, betrayer? Betrayer! Filth!”_

The words hurt him worse than the physical assault. He tried to scamper up to his feet, wings flapping haphazardly, but his head was spinning and he couldn’t make out up from down. He managed to squeeze out a hoarse squeak through his abused throat, and then a louder high-pitched caw. 

Maleficent let out a whimper of her own. Just as quickly as her rage exploded, it seemed to wither away at the sound of his voice, but she was still staring at Diaval with those unhinged eyes, loose hair wild, teeth bared and clenched. Her hands were still in a position to strike, green magic rippling around them. She breathed fast, ragged breaths, and so did he, his beak wide open. 

They so stood, frozen. His heart was going like a hummingbird. His wings were shaking, spread wide.   
Then, he let out a hacking sound which he supposed was a cough. He wasn’t certain; he had never coughed in his bird form before. But it felt ugly, it was hurting his throat and chest, it was convulsive and he had no control over it. It made him feel like he was choking again. 

“... _Diaval_?” Maleficent whispered.

A click of her fingers sent him into a splay of long limbs and a distinctive lack of wings. Also, he immediately doubled over, coughing horribly.

“That...” he heaved, “...is no way...to handle a bird...even Aurora knows... by now”, and he continued to cough, his throat feeling like being shredded with razors. He tasted blood and swallowed it, only to have some coughed out in a next convulsive fit; a foamy, pinkish slime which he quickly wiped off with his sleeve.

Immediately, she surrounded him with her golden magic, and the unmistakable warmth of healing washed over him. He sat still on his heels, savoring the sensation, but never taking his eyes off his obviously shaken mistress. 

“Your arm”, he murmured, indicating where his talons had raked at her skin. She looked at it, but under the drying blood, the wounds were already healed, and she huffed dismissively.

She stood very still as he kneeled before her, but her breathing was shaky, her eyes stormy and Diaval knew that the best course of action was the expectant one. He was silent and calmer by the second, now that he was rather certain she had reestablished her grip on reality. He waited for her to speak first, move first, relieved for the disappearance of pain in his throat and back.

“This is no longer a dream”, she spoke finally, in a voice so quiet and small that his heart immediately went out to her. He had never heard her sound so insecure, so…frightened. It frightened him. “Is it?”

“No”, he answered, just as quietly. “This is real.”

“Why were you here at all?” she growled, her attitude changing from shaky to angry in the blink of an eye. She was about as stabile as quicksand at the moment, and equally dangerous; yet, Diaval was calm.

“I heard you were awake. I went in to see what was happening.”

“Well, I _wasn’t_ awake, and your inability to refrain from poking that long beak of yours where it doesn’t belong almost cost you your feathered hide, you meddling fool!” she snarled. But her eyes were still wide and haunted. Fearful.

“I only wanted to help, mistress.”

“You are not allowed to approach me in my sleep!” she rose her voice. “Do you understand me? You are not allowed to approach me in my sleep when I didn’t allow it! You are – “

“Allow me, then!” he blurted out on impulse. 

He almost regretted it when he saw the flaggabastered expression on her face. He thought, for a moment, that he had truly outstepped well away from his boundaries- that she was going to incinerate him, or turn him permanently into a centipede, or, the worse of all, erase the expanded mind she had granted him five years ago and revert him back into an ordinary raven, with no memory of his beloved human fledgling and his mercurial mistress. Just a raven, seven seasons old but still without a mate or a home, his life revolving around food, potential mating, avoiding predators and eventually dying of injury, starvation or predation, spending the rest of his days with a gnawing feeling of having been something else once, feeling something more, loving somebody else, having a home somewhere, but never being able to tell where these feelings come from, or understanding them. 

“What did you say?” she hissed.

“With all due respect, mistress”, he latched his eyes on hers, still kneeling before her, but refusing to cast his eyes down, “but who is going to chase your nightmares away, if I’m not allowed to?” 

She blinked.

“Chase my…”  
He nodded, never letting his eyes leave hers.

Something seemed to be clicking into place in her mind. Colors swiveled in her eyes, gold over green, over and over. Silence stretched, and neither seemed to know how to break it, or dare to.

“I have many dreams”, she spoke, barely above a whisper, “none of them pleasant. But they all end…”   
To his surprise, she was the one who turned her gaze away. Her jaw clenched. 

“…they all end when you show up. In my dreams, I hear your voice, and it all…all stops. The pain, the…when you come, he is gone, and the curse is…”

It was Diaval’s turn to blink owlishly. 

"Sometimes...we fly together.” 

She said it so quietly, eyes glimmering golden, that Diaval wasn’t certain he had heard it correctly. But he didn’t dare questioning her. He couldn’t, actually, because his throat got choked up, and he couldn’t find his voice if he wanted to. His eyes started burning with tears. 

"This time, though, you didn’t come…on time. And when I saw you here, I thought it was still…”

She was barely ripping the words out of her throat. Diaval couldn’t watch her suffer any more. 

"Mistress, you don’t- you don’t have to…” he swallowed. His own voice sounded stuffed and shaky. He blinked away the tears, but one escaped, running down his face. He made no attempt to wipe it away. His hands felt wooden.

“What do you do?” she asked, staring him down. Her lips were barely moving. “When I dream, what is it that you do, to come to my dreams?”

“I just…I just sing to you”, he admitted, trying to make out her features through his blurred vision. “In raven- speak. Nothing more. I suppose that’s…that’s what you hear. In your dream. I suppose.”

"How long?”

"Since we first met.”

“You never said anything."

"I didn’t want to upset you.”

"Am I not upset now?”

"Are you angry at me?”

"I am angry that you put yourself in danger! I would never…” 

She trailed away, lips pressed firmly. But there was no poisonous green in her eyes now. 

“It is not your obligation, Diaval. Your fealty doesn’t extend that far.”

"I bound myself to you. You didn’t bind me to yourself. My doing. My fealty. My limits. My decision.”

She seemed almost amused at his boldness. “Oh, so I am a mistress with no say in my servant’s doings?” she paused. “Are you certain that is how our agreement works?”

“I am”, he said firmly, looking her straight in the eyes. “I live by your wish. I do everything you ask of me to the best of my abilities. I do my absolute best at catering to your every need and request. But don’t expect me to idly watch you suffer and not interfere. I am not capable- I could not…could not take that.”

She stared at him with unreadable expression. He stared back, waiting to be turned into a salamander.

"I could have killed you there, and I would have realized it only when it would be too late, you arrogant pile of feathers.”

"But you didn’t.”

"You look uncomfortably unafraid for someone whom I have just nearly throttled to death.”

"I am not afraid, and almost doesn’t count.”

"I cannot corroborate that.” She squinted at him. “You truly have no fear of me anymore, do you?”

“Uh.” His eyebrows rose apologetically, with a sheepish smile. 

“Well, you should, you ridiculous creature. Was this not an indication enough? I have to repeat myself, because this doesn’t seem to be sinking in with you: I almost killed you.”

"But you didn’t, and it wasn’t even on purpose.”

She glared at him incredulously. “And imagine what I would do on purpose, then!”

"But you won’t.”

"How do you know?” she growled. She made an impatient movement with her foot, as if she was about to stomp it on the floor like a petulant child, but stopped herself. 

He shrugged. “I know. I just know.”

"Even the closest of friends sometimes turn on one another, Diaval. You are far too trusting. How you managed to survive on your own before we met is beyond me.”

“Well, I wasn’t doing a very good job at surviving when we met, to be honest.” He frowned. “Despite the fact I never trusted anybody after I fledged. Until you.”

She was silent after this. She spoke with her eyes, though; golden and pale leafy green looking down at him, as he kneeled before her still, watching her. The branchy flooring was starting to dig uncomfortably in his knees; still, he felt like moving right now wasn’t the right course of action.

Silence stretched, but surprisingly not uncomfortable, as she continued to stare at him with that unfathomable, tumultuous expression, before saying: “You truly are a weird creature.”

"Now, mistress, I believe the proper term would be ‘unique’. Or 'amazing'. Perhaps 'astonishing'.”

The subtlest hint of a smile tugged at the corner of her lips. “No doubt about that.”

"You are a rather specific kind of person yourself, if I may be free to observe.”

“This shouldn’t have happened.” She cut him off.

"What?” the sudden change of her tone made him feel like he’d swallowed a hot stone. He hadn’t been afraid that she was going to hurt him, intentionally or not, but he was afraid now, of…something. 

“You getting hurt by me”, she explained in a flat, expressionless voice, and a look to match.   
Not having much desire to argue that, and knowing this was as close to an apology he was ever going to get, Diaval answered with as much cheerfulness as he could muster: “Water under the bridge. It won’t happen again anyway.”

She continued to give him that flat, emotionless expression, but the knuckles on her clenched fists were white. “And how do you know that? Have you developed some sort of precognition skills that I’m not aware of?”

"I’ll be more attentive in future to react on time, not when you are too far gone in your nightmare”, he explained, as softly as his raspy voice would let him. “I can’t allow my dream counterpart to betray you again, now can I?”

"Are you- you cannot take responsibility for the contests of my dreams, Diaval” Maleficent started to sound exasperated. 

"And now that you know you can expect me to be around, it won’t startle you so much to see me here. I should have announced myself, really.”

She squinted at him. “You are trying very hard to make it all sound like it was your fault that I lost the connection with reality and nearly crushed your windpipe.”

"Fault is a heavy word. I prefer ‘responsibility’.”

Unconsciously, he rubbed his throat, and froze mid-breath when her hand, the same one that viciously assaulted him half an hour ago, now came to his throat and her fingertips brushed his scarred skin there, sending goosebumps up in his hair and down his back. He couldn’t resist; he closed his eyes and shivered, barely managing to suppress a shaky sigh of pleasure. 

The touch of her fingers on his bare human skin was so, oh-so-much more intense than on his feathers. And he had thought he had been in trouble then. The second wave of goosebumps came when her sharp talon-like nail traced a line over his jaw, and this time, he did gasp quietly and hoped very much that he won’t be required to stand up now. He wouldn’t be able to disguise the weakness in his legs, or the swelling in his groin, which was making appearance with alarming speed. He rested his hands in his lap to hide it. It was a fun thing sometimes, in rare occasions when he had alone time in his human skin, but at the moment, the last thing he wanted was Maleficent to think his primary motivation was to couple with her, now that they were having a preciously soul- baring moment. A moment he didn’t hope it would repeat any time soon, if ever. He closed his eyes, savoring the softness of her fingertips and the sharpness of her nails on his face, trying to have it etched into his memory, to remember it forever, for his soul to feed upon it when he’s alone and touch- starved and craving for comfort.

Her hand lingered on, her thumb stroking his temple; her nails were grazing under his chin, right on the fine border of pain and pleasure, and he could swear she knew exactly how her touch affected him. She caressed him often as a raven, but they never talked about it, not even once. As such, he never voiced his absolute adoration of her touch, but didn’t refrain anymore from expressing it in his body language and blissful purring when it happened. Without exchanging a single word, she had long learned exactly how he loved to be caressed the most, and he had learned by the softening of her features and the warm glow in her eyes that she loved those moments, too. 

But she had never touched him that way in his human form before, and now he was in his personal seventh heaven. 

“I don’t deserve this kind of dedication”, she said softly, removing her hand and drawing a shaky gasp of yearning out of him. Stricken by her uncharacteristic display of raw emotion, he opened his eyes to look at her, and her face was a waxen mask. 

"No,” he said quietly. “You deserve so much more.”

She scoffed at that. “Of course. Mistress of evil. Curser of infants. Killer of men. Tyrant of the Moors. I deserve skies of rainbows and fields of golden blooms.”

"May I speak freely, mistress?”

"If I said ‘no’, would it make any difference?”

"Self-pity isn’t your color.”

She glared at him. “Is that a way to speak with your mistress?”

"Apparently yes; otherwise, I’d already be a bird.”

She grinned and rose a hand in a familiar way. He was back in his feathers before he could say as much as ‘wait’.

“Thank you for reminding me”, she smirked at the flustered raven, who shook himself and quickly smoothened the ruffled feathers on his back.

But he was actually quite pleased with how long she had managed to hold on in their not very easy conversation. And besides, his physical arousal, now thankfully subsiding, was much less intense and much easier to hide in his raven body.

He watched her turn away, and knowing she was done with him, he hopped towards the leafy curtain that covered the entrance of her home. He hoped they could both get some more sleep before dawn, and that he’ll have some time to repeat the memory of her touch over and over in his mind. Perhaps even dream of it, if he was lucky. 

"And just where are you going now?”

" _Arrk?_ ”   
Surprised, he turned back, and saw her growing something out of the wall of branches high up, above her own nest, close to the leafy ceiling. Her hands performed elegant, circular motions in the air, and the growth of the thin branches followed her lead, creating a rounded, nest-like structure, comfortable enough for a raven to roost in.

It was good that ravens couldn’t cry, because if they could, he would have certainly embarrassed himself by crying tears of joy and grinning like an idiot.

Maleficent not- quite- looked at him, her eyes failing to lock with his own, and the arch of her eyebrows heralded a question, not an order. Her jaws were clenched tight.

No, not a question. A _plea_.

Diaval answered with a very human-like nod of his head, and a completely raven-like happy wag of his tail and wings. When her jaws relaxed and her eyes took on a warm color of honey, he fluttered up to his new nest and made a big, happy fuss at settling in, making exalted chirrups which Maleficent would easily translate as ‘ _thank you, thank you, I’m happy, happy, happy’_ if she could understand raven-speak. And perhaps she could. At least Diaval-speak, she could. 

But just to make sure, he fluttered down again to land on her shoulder, and rubbed his head against her cheek affectionately. It was a gamble, equally possible to end up with him being turned into a glowworm, or with her returning the sentiment by petting his back or belly. 

But it payed off. He was again rewarded by that lazy, thorough strokes of his chest, the kind of seemingly aloof, but very determined, precise touch that he adored. Thankfully, her hand didn’t travel low on his belly, so he didn’t have to worry about getting…overexcited, again. He was certain she was teasing him on purpose sometimes, and she knew that he knew, and he knew that she knew that he knew, even if they never spoke a word about it, but now she wasn’t trying to remind him of her dominance, or sweet-torture him a little bit to amuse herself, or whatever her motivations at those moments were. 

Now, she was merely trying to calm herself with their shared touch…and to tell him ‘thank you’ in all possible ways except with those two little words. 

She sat herself on the edge of her nest, Diaval on her shoulder, and still, not a word was spoken. The only sound was his soft, loving cooing and her breathing, slower and deeper by the minute. The movements of her fingers around his neck and chest were becoming slower, too. The fairy lights in her abode were glowing dimmer, and Diaval felt the reverberations of her heartbeat slowing down underneath his belly. Finally, her hand dropped down in her lap. Her head was slowly inclining forward, and her eyes were curtained by her long, loose hair.

Just when Diaval started to worry that she was going to fall asleep sitting and keel over, she stirred, as if remembering herself. Even in the dimming light of her fairy lights, he could see that she looked up towards his graciously given (and rightfully earned) place inside her home and eyed him questioningly.

He immediately showed his appreciation for the gift by fluttering up and settling in, cooing so delightedly that he knew he was an embarrassment for the entire ravenkind, but he just couldn’t help himself.

Maleficent had wrapped herself up in her brown quilt and curled up in her nest, legs drawn to her chest, making her wing stumps protrude with heartbreaking obviousness. She waved her hand, and the fairy lights dimmed down almost entirely, leaving only the faintest of purple lights glowing at the edges of both of their nests. 

Just when Diaval thought she was definitely asleep now, she spoke for the first time since she made his nest: “One condition. No droppings outside your roost. And you clean it. Daily.”

The sound he made was alarmingly similar to a human snort. As if it was imaginable at all that a finely groomed bird like himself would be surrounded in filth; truly, that fairy was sometimes nothing short of silly. Of course, one had to forgive such lapse of judgement to a person who obviously chose to conveniently forget that it was _her_ who invited _him_ in, not the other way around, and as such, she wasn’t in the position to give out conditions. 

But he was more that willing to let it slide. She was Maleficent, after all, and Maleficent _didn’t_ invite anybody in, _didn’t_ have difficulties facing her dreams alone, _didn’t_ enjoy caressing him as much as he enjoyed being caressed, and _certainly didn’t_ need him getting closer to her in the night to protect her from nightmares. 

He looked down at her huddled, thin frame, barely visible by the pale purple lights. For all her formidable power, her bravery, her vengefulness, her coldness and determination, she looked so fragile at the moment, alone in her large nest, all thin bones and silky hair, and he wished she would allow him to be closer, so that he could protect her better, cover her with his wings, coo the calming sounds right into her ear. 

But he knew very well that being allowed to merely being inside was nothing short of a miracle, and that her comfort boundaries were stretched enough as they were. He was the first person after Stefan whom she trusted enough to sleep next to her, and to say that he was proud of that would be a vast understatement. The fact that he had to be a bird, not a man for that to happen didn’t bother him much. He was determined to be worthy of her trust, whether she acknowledges that or not. 

And whether she acknowledges it or not, the night changed something between them.

Physically, they were resting about as far from one another as they were when he was roosting right outside the entrance, but somehow, it felt so much closer.

It felt as if they were touching still.


	5. Ticklish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Diaval learns the different effects of tickling, depending of the pesron involved. Also, a secret is revealed.

_I’m getting too old for this_ , Diaval thought as he hopped on the pile of dry leaves, snapping his beak- ever so carefully- at the hem of Aurora’s dress, trying to catch her. _But I’ll never grow tired of it._

The energetic seven- years- old possessed the speed of a peregrine hawk, and the cleverness of a raven (which made Diaval’s hackles ruffle with pride). Every time he would get close to her, she would roll over at the very last moment with a delighted squeal, and his beak would catch only thin air, or a dry leaf. 

They have made quite a mess on the forest floor, rolling and flapping while playing tag in the pile of colorful chestnut leaves. Aurora’s hair and dress were covered in it to the point that she looked like a leaf fairy, and Diaval wondered if Maleficent- hiding in the shadows and pretending to be bored, as usual- had the same impression. He wondered if she would ever admit how much her heart had grown fond of the child, or would she continue to deny that her step was lighter and her eyes brighter every time after she would spend the day in the girl’s proximity. He wondered when exactly was she going to revoke the curse. Would she come to her senses sooner, or rather later, as he had the feeling that would be the case, stubborn as she was? 

Because he had absolutely no doubt that Maleficent would do it. She might not have known that just yet, but Diaval did. His only concern was if she would be successful. 

His worrying thoughts distracted him, and he was unmoving for way too long. His little predator jumped from the ground where she had crouched, rising a cloud of red and golden leaves, and her swift fingers brushed the edge of his tail before he managed to get to the air. 

"Got you!” Aurora’s laughter rang among the trees, tugging at his heartstrings sweetly and painfully at the same time. Goodness, how he loved that overgrown little fledgling. To think that the time would come when that beloved laughter would be no more, when he’d never again see those mischievous blue eyes sparkling...unimaginable. 

He shuddered. His mistress would come to her senses. She would. One day.

“Come on, Pretty bird!” Aurora fell on her back into the heap of leaves again, kicking some with her dirty bare feet. “You are making this too easy! Tired already?”

He wasn’t tired, to be honest, but he did suddenly feel the need for some gentleness rather than raucous action. He hopped to her face and rubbed his head against her cheek, finding comfort in her solid, warm presence. Accepting his unspoken wish, Aurora stilled herself and scratched the back of his neck. If he had any regrets considering this little one, it was the fact that she had grown so big that he couldn’t simply sit on her and protect her with his wings as if he would do to a raven hatchling. 

After a while, he spotted a tasty- looking beetle scurrying through the leaves and hopped after it, eliciting another bout of laughter from Aurora when he deliberately missed the insect, and made a big show of attempting to catch it. In the midst of his dramatic hunt, something on Aurora’s bare foot caught his attention. A twig got stuck to the sole of the said foot and, in his opinion, it had to be digging uncomfortably in the child’s soft skin. 

He cut his hunt short, scooped the beetle up with his beak and gobbled it up, making Aurora cheer and clap, and then fluttered to the girl’s foot, gently trying to pick the twig with the tip of his beak. 

To his shock, Aurora shrieked and jumped away as if burnt. His heart nearly stopped, and he sprang away himself, cawing, first alarmed, then mortified, thinking he had hurt her.  
But the next moment, he realized that Aurora was shrieking with _laughter_.

"That _tickles_!” she announced, grinning like mad, looking at him with that look full of joy.

Tickles? He had heard of tickling, of course, and witnessed humans tickling one another on his spying missions, albeit very rarely; mostly parents playing with little children, or subadults in their ungainly attempts of what appeared to be pre- mating rituals. But he never paused to give the awkward act a second thought. 

The playful grin on the hatchling’s face was unmistakable, and it challenged every mischievous bone he had in his body. Which was plenty.  
He slowly approached her feet again, and then quickly jumped on her ankle. She shrieked with laughter, but had enough self- control not to kick him away, for which he was grateful, but even if it wasn’t the case, he’d still go through his evil plan. Very gently but swiftly, he started nipping at the sole of her foot, and it had her rolling away with uncontrollable laughter. He had to flutter away so she wouldn’t roll over him, and he his heart was full to bursting with happiness as he watched her laughing like never before, eyes brimming with joyous tears. 

"AHAHAHAH!!!”, she shrieked like mad, doubled over with laughter. “You fiend!!! Oh, I’ll get you for this, I will!”   
And she jumped to her feet, leaves flying in all directions around her. “Know what? Let’s see if birds are ticklish!”

And she sprinted after him with such speed, bright eyes and wide grin and all, that he barely had the time to say ‘ _awk_ ’ and hastily put his wings to good use. Laughing still, the girl charged after the low- flying raven, yelling “ _Come back, I won’t tickle, promise!”_ , while he glided away, just short of her reach, croaking boisterously.

oOo

“I thought, initially, that your tendency for immature behavior was due to your young age, but here we are, seven years later, and I see now that it’s simply an irreparable character flaw on your part.”

Diaval paid little mind to his mistress’ depreciative words. Long were gone the days when he’d be confused and hurt by her caustic ways. He knew too well by now to recognize her attempts of goading him into communicating with her without having to simply ask for it. Also, he was rather certain that she thought she was merely teasing him benevolently. He now actually found her abrasive manners endearing and touching, and he wondered sometimes if that meant that he had learned to understand her, or simply that he had been thoroughly brainwashed by her constant company.

He decided not to give in right away. Let her make some effort around him for a little while. He shrugged his wings a bit- ‘ _as you say, mistress_ ’- and continued to pick apart a piece of deer flesh he had managed to trick away from an inexperienced pack of young wolves. It was laughable how the old trick of pulling at their tails, having them turn at him and then pivoting back to snatch a treat right under their smelly jaws worked well on the youngsters.

"Tickling, of all the silly things you could have thought of. She could have kicked you in your wing, and then I’d have to silence her wailing over you, not to mention going through the trouble of healing you. As if I don’t have anything better to do with my time.”

Diaval could have pointed out that she spent most of the day doing literally nothing, other than spying on him and Aurora, had he been in his man- shape. A bird that he currently was, he ignored her and extended his neck, making a large chunk of meat go down his gullet. 

"Absolutely no sense of dignity, either. What on earth is the appeal of losing control of yourself, roll on the ground like an idiot and howl like a lunatic? It was distasteful to watch.”

 _I’ll give you distasteful_ , Diaval thought and picked the last bloody morsel in his beak, then fluttered to Maleficent’s shoulder, offering the food to his mistress. She couldn’t blame the bird for acting like a bird, after all.

"Ugh! Diaval! Off!” she shooed him away. “Argh! How many times do I have to tell you? I don’t eat carrion!”   
He shrugged away, amused at her disgusted expression, and swallowed the meat himself. Silly fairy. She had no idea what she was missing.

"For goodness sake, you stink of blood. Wash yourself. Now!” she scolded him, brushing away the place on her shoulder where he had landed. He croaked at her, amused by the sight of her scrunched nose, and had he been a man, he’d been sporting a huge, challenging grin on his face. He loved to shake her out of her cage as much as she loved to shake him out of hers, and while his option set was limited in his bird form, he could still give as good as he got from her, in his own way.

Still, she was right; he needed a bath. He landed at the nearby stream, drank his fill and started splashing around exuberantly. The droplets had gotten to Maleficent, obviously, because she wiped her brow and continued berating him: “And there again. Absolutely no dignity whatsoever. One would think you have only just fledged.” 

But she walked to the stream herself, lifted her robe to her knees and lowered her bare feet in the water herself, her composed grace in stark contrast with Diaval’s energetic shakes.

The idea which suddenly came to him was nothing short of suicide, he knew. So what? She was unlikely to kill him at this point. As she herself pointed out every now and then, what would she do for wings then?

He waited, after he was done with his bath. He took his time preening, all the while watching her with one keen eye, as she pulled her feet out of the water and stretched her elegant legs on the grass, leaning back on a tree. 

He waited, listening to her falling into disconcerted silence, after being unsuccessful at goading him into asking to be turned into a man and engaging into a squabble with her. 

He waited as she relaxed, staring into the distance, but still shifting her aching back occasionally against the tree.

When he decided he had waited enough, he swooped in the air, landed softly at her feet, checked one last time she wasn’t looking at him, and nibbled at the sole of her foot with a feather-light touch of his beak.

That was the first time he had ever seen Maleficent, great and terrible and powerful, yelping with badly suppressed bark of laughter, and jerking her feet, eyes wide as saucers. The expression on her face was worth every moment of punishment which was undoubtedly coming. She looked wildly at him, a mixture of stunning disbelief, devastating rage and overwhelming mirth.

" _Did you just...”_ she hissed at him, greenish- gold magic collecting around her clenched fist.

But it was too late. The laughter which escaped her could not be unheard. The tug of smile at her lips could not be unseen. Quickly, while he still had time, before she comes around from her shocked disbelief at his audacity, he repeated the action, his reflexes lightning fast, and this time she laughed like a ringing of million little bells, pulling her feet away but nevertheless grinning like an idiot she had just accused him to be. The wisps of magic died between her fingers. “ _Diaval, you- you insolent- don’t you dare- don't you- “_

Oh, he dared. He fluttered towards her ankles, like he did with Aurora, but Maleficent was no child, and no human. She evaded him with ridiculous ease and jumped to her feet. He had expected that, of course, and he was equally fast as her. In what he knew was his last draw in this game, he charged up, in her eye- level, and cackled wildly, proclaiming his victory. He was looking at two weeks' worth in frog shape anyway. Her laughter in his ear and the dazed gleam in her eyes were satisfactory compensations. 

As expected, the next thing he knew was the blast of magic immobilizing him. He was then met by his mistresses’ burning eyes. She still looked shocked beyond belief, but for all her exercise in making her face a blank mask, she couldn’t wipe the fanged grin off her face.

"Eight years going by, and you still manage to surprise me”, she said through gritted teeth. 

"Awk”, he said innocently, floating before her face and feeling terrified and exalted at the same time.

“Into a man”, he heard her whisper. Her having to utter the incantation to change him was indication how excited she still was. For years now, she was able to do it wordless, not even looking at him. But it was effective nonetheless. He found himself floating wingless, featherless and clumsy before her. There was no help for him. All the fairy folks that were present around them scattered away, not a pixie in sight, though they no doubt observed them, hidden, from the safe distance.

"What are you going to do to me, mistress?” Diaval asked, making his eyes as big and sad as possible. If there was ever the time for him to use every weapon available in his very meagre Maleficent- softening arsenal, it was now. 

Instead of answering, she had vines and branches springing from the ground for his arms and legs. In a moment, he found himself pinned on his back, arms spread wide, all limbs tied firmly to the ground. The predatory look on Maleficent’s face was rare to see on a creature which claimed to dislike meat. But it was when she straddled his hips, crouching on his groin, and run a sharp nail down his throat, over his chest and down his stomach, that he felt truly frozen. Whether from fear or from exhilaration because of her touch, he couldn’t say. Still, he regretted nothing. His heart was beating wildly, and his lower body felt tingly and incredibly warm the moment she seated herself over his crotch. She was going to feel it; there was no way she wouldn’t feel it, unless she mercifully kills him before he is completely hard. It would be a very lovely death.

“I wonder”, she whispered, looking at him with those unfathomable metallic eyes, “I wonder if this particular bird is ticklish.”

She wiggled the fingers on her both hands. Every finger was equipped with a long, sharp, talon- like fingernail.

 _Oops_.

Diaval experimentally pulled at his restraints, finding them entirely unbreakable. Not that he particularly wanted to be liberated. But he needed to at least appear to try. His breathing was now fast and shallow, and he was absolutely convinced that she was wiggling against his pelvis completely on purpose, to torture him. Her success was absolute. He wanted the torture to last. And she knew that. If that wasn’t victory on her part, he didn’t know what was. 

Her nails grazed his chest, traveling slow, causing goosebumps to erupt all over his skin, before suddenly plunging to his sides and the oversensitive area under his arms. 

The sound of his cackling laughter that echoed though the glen was unrecognizable even to himself. So was the extent of joy that overflooded him. His body was writhing on the grass, bound, completely at her mercy, while his heart was soaring higher than his wings could ever take him, and he wondered how and when did he fall so completely in love with her.

  
oOo

  
When she finally released him, none of them spoke. They looked at one another, short of breath, his eyes still watering and the hiccups from his laughter only beginning to subside. And they were both grinning, both refusing to look away first, both stubbornly holding their ground.

True, she gave him much more than she got in their tickling war. True, she also threw in her usual teasing game, this time amplified tenfold, and redirected what was supposed to be an innocent, friendly prank war into something much...different, and she got him there, got him better than ever; he was desperate for release, quite obviously, and he knew she knew, but mercifully didn’t comment on it. There was no need for words. They both knew. He was grateful that she couldn’t see the absolute, unwavering love in his heart, though, and mock him for it. She wouldn’t take love so lightly and playfully as she did lust.

But he had his victory, too, and there was nothing she could do about it. 

Because he now knew that Maleficent, the Mistress of all evil, the Curser of children, the Queen of the Moors, the Slayer of kings and soldiers...was, in fact, very, very _ticklish_.


	6. A helping hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maleficent lends a helping hand to Diaval.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this is ridiculous, but I just had to get it out of my system. :)

„Diaval, stop fussing. I understand your anxiety, but you are making this much harder than it’s supposed to be.”

“I’m sorry, mistress, I’m just…nervous. It’s the first time that…”

"Oh, hush now. Lay still, I’ll take care of everything.”

“You always do.”

"Well, what’s with the pout, now? I’m not stopping you from taking the matter in your hands.”

“I have more faith in you, mistress.”

"That’s flattering, but I’m afraid I am not adequately experienced, either.”

"….please?”

“Oh, for goodness sake. Fine. Lay down and be still.”

“Just…don’t break it. It will trouble me for weeks, then.”

“How can I break such a tiny little thing? I can barely get a grip.”

“It’s not that tiny!”

“It would help if it was more…substantial.”

“It doesn’t feel insubstantial to me. It’s a right pain.”

“I’m trying to help, am I not? Stop fussing, I can’t get a proper hold.”

“Ow!”

“Be still!”

“That hurt!”

“Apologies. I’ll be more gentle, you gentle flower, you.”

“Not funny. Ah!”

“For the umpteenth time, Diaval, be still. Ah, there it is. Now…nice and slow.”

“Is it…is it hurting you, mistress?”

“Not at all. Ah! It slipped out. Don’t move. If I take off the protection, I could-“

“No! Mistress, don’t! Leave it on. Please.”

“I can barely feel anything this way.”

“Perhaps I should just take care of it myself. I shouldn’t have put you in this position.”

“Nonsense. Just let me readjust. Ah, I have it.”

“Ouch!”

“Oh, for goodness sake, Diaval!”

“You surprised me!”

“I said no pulling back!”

“No, you did not!”

“I said don’t move! That very much counts!”

“Are you deliberately torturing me?”

“I am trying to help you, you ungrateful bird!” 

“I know, I’m sorry…I just- I’m not used that someone touches my person like that.”

“Neither am I, but here we are. Let’s go again, shall we?” 

“It’s still inside?”

“Can’t you feel it?”

“I don’t know what I’m feeling anymore.”

“All right; I think I’m in a good position now. Be a good bird and let me take this to an end, all right?”

“I don’t think I’ll be able to walk after this.”

“I can’t concentrate if you’ll keep yammering, Diaval.”

“Sorry, mistress. Ah!”

“For goodness sake, hold on for just a few more moments!”

“Mistress, hurry, please, I can’t…”

“Almost there, almost there, just don’t…”

“Oh!”

“…and done. Oh, finally, thank goodness.”

“Are you…are you done? Is it out?”

“Look for yourself.”

With that, Maleficent’s gloved hand presented Diaval with a tip of an iron needle, which she had just pulled out of his foot. Diaval sat up from where he was reclining and looked at the offending metal piece, then at his bare foot. He flexed it experimentally and sighed with relief. “Oh, finally. Thank you, mistress, thank you, thank you.”

“No need to thank me. I did it mostly so you would stop whining about it. You were driving me insane.”

Diaval looked adequately sheepish. “You are not burned, are you?”

“No, the gloves worked well. Besides, it’s only a tiny little thing. I can’t believe you weren’t able to pull it out yourself.”

“It’s a foot! It’s sensitive. I’m a sensitive bird.” Diaval pouted, rubbing his aching limb, and Maleficent’s hand hovered over it, healing it completely. As she did that, she glanced at her companion with sudden suspicion, which only intensified when she caught a mischievous gleam in his eye, and a hint of a crooked smile on his lips.

“Diaval, you didn’t make this entire performance of woe and misery only so I would fuss over you, now did you?” 

“Who, me? Mistress, what do you think of me? Do you truly believe I am capable of such deception?”  
Her eyes narrowed, observing the intensifying gleam of mirth in his black eyes. “Yes. I do.”

“You wound me. I merely have much more faith in your incredible healing touch than in my clumsy human hands.”

“Oh, you incorrigible bird.” She put a finger under his chin and grazed the soft skin there with her fingernail. But there was an amused glint in her eyes, too, despite the coldness of her voice. “Next time, I’ll just leave you to take care of yourself with your own two hands.”

He cleared his throat, and it sounded strangely like “ ‘ _s ususal_ ”.

“What was that?”

“Nothing, mistress. Forgive me if I disappointed you. I simply didn’t want to do anything that would hamper my ability to serve you.”

He was openly grinning now, so she rolled her eyes at him, leaning on her staff to rise to her feet. “The amount of ridiculousness you are capable of putting together…”

Once on her feet, she offered him her hand to rise up. He looked at it as if not knowing what to do with it, suddenly serious, and it was her turn to smirk at his surprise.

“What? My touch no longer appeals to you, now that you have no need for it?”

“Oh, no”, he replied, recovering quickly, taking her hand and allowing her to pull him to his feet. “Never, mistress. Never.”

For a fraction of a moment, they stood hand in hand, exchanging a look- hers suddenly guarded, his suddenly panicked.

“Ow, my poor foot!” Diaval wailed, stumbling. “Like a dagger has been put through my flesh!”

Maleficent caught him, rolling her eyes at his dramatics, but incredibly grateful for his quick wit for saving them both from awkwardness. “Oh, stop that. It was a tip of a needle, not a sword.”

“But it feels like a sword to my delicate self.”

“It feels like a load of attention-seeking to me”, she answered and poked him in the ribs with a sharp fingernail. He yelped and flinched away. “Still enjoying my healing touch? My helping hand?”

“Always, mistress”, Diaval smiled, rubbing his side. “Always.”


	7. Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Regular birds don't dream much, but Diaval is no regular bird.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My parrot occasionaly suffers from night terrors, and the poor thing appears as if she will die of fright in those moments. She inspired me for this one.
> 
> -‐----------------

Diaval didn’t know dreams this thoroughly before he was introduced to human mind. 

More accurately, he hardly knew dreams at all. They were very short, discombobulated, and mostly consistent of raven calls. Some were calm, when he dreamed of calling to his siblings and friends; others, not so much, when he dreamed of shrill warning screeches. But he never used to have something so unpleasant that could be categorized as a nightmare; he wasn’t even aware that such things existed. Not until he was introduced up close and personal with Maleficent’s difficult nights.

Even then, as his dreams lengthened and became more complex over the years, they were never outright horrible. A bit unpleasant, sometimes; other times, the exact opposite, especially when he dreamt of his mistress (and in those times, he was very grateful that he didn’t sleep in his man-shape. If only he uttered some of the things that crossed his dream...) but most were neutral. 

Which was why he was completely unprepared when his tired brain started replaying the day’s events, one rather cold night after he had almost gotten trapped in Stefan’s castle, the wind slamming the window behind him while he was gathering information- and definitely not snooping- in the royal library. 

  
oOo

  
He didn’t know how Maleficent would react if she knew how fascinated he was by written word, and that he was trying to learn to read himself by spying on the lectures Stefan was being given by his exasperated scholars. So, when the king and his tutors vacated the enormous room, walls padded by shelves full of books from floor to the ceiling, Diaval fluttered on the desk to get a better look on the lecture which was still open there. And he had gotten so exhilarated by the fact that he could, by now, read the most of it, if a bit slow, that he completely failed to notice the rise in wind outside until the window slammed shut. Upon realizing that he couldn’t open it himself, he decided, now quite alarmed and with a heavy heart, to hide high in the rafters and wait for the nightfall, when most of the castle occupants go to sleep, to search for the alternate route out.   
He spent most of the day dreading that the library door, which were left slightly ajar in Stefan’s frustrated departure, will get shut too. Then he would have no way out. But he was lucky that the overworked servants were few in number and neglectful in their tiredness. When the night fell, he carefully peeked out, down the long hallway, lit by flickering orange flames, and fluttering from shadow to shadow, searched for an open window.   
Now, the dread of being caught combined with the overwhelming sensation of being trapped in a net again, only much larger this time, was enough to wrack his nerves quite thoroughly. Alse, he knew that Maleficent was expecting him for quite some time, called for him, and he knew he’d be facing her wrath if he manages to get out of this predicament alive. But none of those things truly did him in.

What did him in were taxidermied animals that adorned the entire hallway.

Now, Diaval was, like all ravens, very much accustomed to death, and usually benefited from it, in fact. He was a hunter and a scavenger; he ate carrion with gusto; he hunted mice with passion; and it wasn’t the fact that those animals were merely dead. 

It was that they were dead, but looked entirely _alive_. Alive and soulless. 

It was their eyes, most of all; he knew with his mind that they were artificial, merely colored glass, but his bird heart was another story. His heart was hammering inside his ribcage as he hurried across the dancing shadows; his heart felt as if those glassy eyes were alive, but void of soul, and were all looking at him. 

The animals were assembled by species, apparently. First, he had to pass two brown bears, the fur on one in rather deplorable state, and the other one’s snout all but fallen off, showing jawbone and yellow teeth. Then it was deer, some full- bodied, some only a head mounted on the wall, and the light flickering in those lifeless eyes pointed at him had him turning around to make sure that some of them won’t start moving after him, following him. He could imagine their dead, long legs squeaking in their rusty joints as they leave their posts to go after him. Then came the wild boars, looking as if they were going to charge after him and take revenge for every time he pranked them by pulling their tails and stealing their food when they would turn around to chase him away. Then wolves, their teeth bared in eternal threatening display, those dull eyes much scarier than they could ever be in their life, no matter how bloodthirsty they got. Foxes, too; one of them was pretty much falling apart, half its fur gone and dry bone and skin visible, and Diaval shied away from it, half- expecting it to start slithering after him, leaving behind the trail of dead fur and skin. 

And finally, the birds. The eagles were more threatening than in life, poised for flight, staring Diaval down with dull yellow eyes that gave away nothing, and so were the kestrels, the hawks and the owls, and the barely controlled fear blossomed into a full- blown panic. Diaval soared into the light, away from the shadows, unable to mind if a human might come along and see him, and glided down the hallway as those undead eyes followed him, accused him of being alive, envied him, wanted him to join them, propped up on one of those walls, forever imprisoned, unmoving. What was the difference between himself and them, other than a bit of luck on his part? They were once like he was; he could very easily become one of them, perhaps only by being here; only by those glassy, lifeless stares.

The last ones down the hall were doves and small songbirds. And somewhere among them, almost imperceptible in the shadows, was a single raven.

It must have been a majestic male, once, though its feathers had mostly lost its tell- tale gender- specific gleam, completely invisible to human eye, but clear as day to birds. His head was hung ominously low, beak wide open as if in a scream, never- ending scream or anyone who might listen, a scream of warning for lost birds which may wander this way, his black eyes gleaming lifelessly at Diaval, asking him to come along, to join him on that cursed wall with not a window in sight; to join him, or perhaps to swap places with him. 

Diaval barely suppressed a scream of his own. Almost blinded by panic, he almost got himself tangled up in thick red curtains covering the entrance into the throne room. He flapped his wings against the fabric, panicked that the guards would hear, panicked that he would get himself caught in a net of a different kind, panicked that he won’t be able to reach that one opened window that he spied up there, high up, close to the rafters- 

oOo

  
Everything was black, pitch black; did he lose his eyesight? 

The panic overtook him, and something inside him gave way, and he finally screamed.

His voice rang horribly in his own ears; he barely recognized himself. But his terror- filled screech did nothing to dispel the darkness which made him feel that he was either in the belly of some beast, swallowed alive, or that he was buried in some windowless tomb with no way out. He wasn’t even aware that he had taken wing, before his blind, erratic flight had him colliding with something hard, which made him lose altitude, but he didn’t fall. Instead, he blindly changed course and within seconds, his head made contact with another invisible obstacle. This happened again, and again, and with each blind, painful collision of his body against the wall, his panic increased, blinding him even more. He was vaguely aware of a voice calling him, maybe, but in the midst of his utter terror, it felt completely irrelevant and distant, barely reaching him through his foggy mind.

Then, suddenly, light came; purplish and golden, illuminating the walls of branches and vines surrounding him, and it felt like having his vision restored after being blind. Feeling like an enormous weight suddenly dropped from his heart, but his heart still beating a furious rhythm in his chest, he landed in a nest- his nest, was this his nest? Was he dreaming now? Or was he dreaming before? – and the voice calling for him became clearer. It wasn’t a loud voice, and even though his brain still had trouble recognizing where, when or what he was, he was comforted to hear that familiar voice.

“Diaval”, the voice repeated, quietly, though sounding a bit strained. “Diaval. Diaval, calm down. All is well. Calm down, Diaval.”

The repetitive sound of his name was soothing; it tethered him to reality, making his breathing slow down, though he was still hissing through wide- open beak and his wings trembled, spread away from his body and seding feathers flying all around him; it made him blink and look around with clearer eyes now. He knew that nest, of course he did, and he knew those walls, leafy and wooden, and he knew that beautiful, calming light that brought him to his senses, and he knew that soft voice most of all, the voice he loved.

“Diaval. It was a dream. It is not real. You are home, Diaval. You are home. All is well. Calm down, Diaval. Calm down, dear. You are home. You are home. It’s only darkness and bad dreams that disturbed you. You are home and all is well.”

His mistress finally came into his focus, illuminated in purple and gold of her fairy lights scattered all over the wall of branches. Her eyes glowed golden, and gold shimmered in her dark hair, falling down her shoulders. She was so beautiful, so powerful, it made him lightheaded (or perhaps the hyperventilation was finally getting to him). He was mesmerized by her fixed stare pointed right at him, and yet, couldn’t take it, and he adverted his gaze, because he was sobering up from his nightmarish haze quite rapidly now, and with that sobering came the horrible realization that he had just woken her up, woken his mistress with his screaming and hysterical flying in walls, in the middle of the night, over nothing. Over a stupid dream.

She was going to turn him into a moth.

His mind entering the panic mode again, and with no way to undo what he had done, he allowed his body to follow the most primal way of expression that was set deep in his bones. He hid his head under his wing, trying to make himself as invisible and inconspicuous as possible, even though he knew it was of course a completely futile effort. He was trembling all over as if he had just flown through a hailstorm.

He felt slender, warm hands picking him up, and he thought his heart would jump out of his throat.  
“Easy now. It’s only me”, she said, almost inaudibly quiet. 

_Only_ her? As if she could ever be anything ‘only’ to him. He was equally relieved that she didn’t sound as if he was in the immediate danger of being turned into an insect, and embarrassed that she could certainly feel his wild heartbeat under her fingers. He mustered courage to look at her, and her face was void of any expression, as was often the case. But the definite lack of ominously green in her eyes and in her magic was not a bad sign. 

“All is well now”, she repeated, and held him gently close against her chest. Her fingers started searching for his favorite petting spots on his neck, below his beak and on his throat, her sharp fingernails feeling a lot like tips of friendly beaks, preening him, consoling him. “All is well. Calm down, my dear bird; your heart is still running like a hawk is after you. It was only a dream. It is over.”

He closed his eyes at such uncharacteristic kindness from the one who was usually so guarded, so cold, knowing that those eyes of his would be welling up in tears had he been in his human form. How could they not, when he could feel her heartbeat now against his own feathered chest, and it felt as if their hears were touching? And despite her expressionless face, her own heart seemed to run faster than what he deemed to be normal for her; apparently, he wasn’t the only one shaken with the rough awakening. 

“Calm down”, she whispered again, probably calming herself as well. He was ashamed, so very much ashamed for disturbing her peace like that, for being so weak, so pathetic, but then again, for once, she wasn’t annoyed by him, as she would usually be when he would challenge her patience, one way or another. And certainly, being awakened in the dead of the night by a screeching, lunatic bird would qualify for a challenge of patience.

Her fingers were still gently scratching his neck, advancing for his back, and he leaned his throat against her breast. Normally, this kind of intimate contact would make him have all kinds of unchaste thoughts and peculiar physical reactions, but now he was still feeling the residual effects of terror, the images of dead, glass eyes still replaying in the back of his mind, and that pretty much smothered any carnal impulses he might have had. What Maleficent’s touch made him feel this time was immeasurable sense of safety and comfort. He hadn’t felt that protected, cherished even, since…well, since forever. She had disposed of his fear with merely being there. Just like that. So simple, so easy.

“Would you like to be a man now?”

The question had him open his eyes and look at her in surprise, tilting his head. She had never asked him before; she would either change him as she would wish, or he would pester her until she yielded. Oh, what would he give if she could be this cordial on regular basis, if he could have this choice more often! But now, he quickly shook his head and croaked disapprovingly. Because what she truly asked was if he would care to talk, to explain himself, and not only he wouldn’t be able to hide his embarrassment, or bring himself to talk about that horrendous nightmare; he would also have to admit he had been careless enough to almost get himself caught in Stefan’s castle, and worse of all, he would have to leave her embrace. And he wasn’t done with being comforted in the warm nest of her arms.

"Good”, and he would have chuckled at the relief in her voice, if he had human mouth. Obviously she wasn’t keen on having a conversation about pesky feelings, either. Or perhaps dealing with an overemotional, grown up man possibly dissolving in a puddle of hysteric tears and wrecked nerves before her feet. Or both. But whatever, it was funny.

 _Maybe she doesn’t want to let go, either_ , he thought, and instantly wanted to chuckle again. Now _he_ was being funny.

Her hand continued to stroke his back, so he purred and allowed his wings to fall to his sides, relaxing completely to her touch. His heart finally settled into more agreeable rhythm, and so did Maleficent’s. The silence between them was not unpleasant, and the touch of her chest against his own, oh, the feel of her steady heartbeat alongside his, this gentleness from the one who tried so hard to be considered a monster by everyone but him…if there ever was a sanctuary for a creature like him, it was right here, in her nest, in her arms, in her heart.

 _I love you_ , he thought. _I love you. I love you because I know you, even if you don’t think that I do. And I know you won’t let that child to perish, even if you don’t know that yourself yet. I love you and I will never, ever give up on you._

The lights started to dim down, and when Diaval noticed it, he couldn’t help but feel the reawakening of dread in his stomach. He will have to sleep again, eventually, and what if he dreams of that horrendous hallway again, what if he wakes again in the dark and loses his wits again? Would Maleficent be this understanding twice in the same night? It didn’t seem likely, but then again, her consoling him like this was never likely in the first place, yet here they were. She needed rest, and he won’t make a fuss over a bit of darkness. He made enough of a fool out of himself already; he won’t admit being suddenly terrified of the dark like a human child. So he remained completely still as the lights started dying off. Only his rapidly increasing heartbeat betrayed him.

But Maleficent felt it. Of course she did; how could she not, huddled with him as they were? Because she looked around, not at him, and the lights flickered to life again. As they did, she murmured, as if to herself: “To better think of it, I’m not in the mood for darkness anymore tonight.”

Diaval looked at her, relieved and grateful beyond measure. There she was, the cruel wielder of dark magic, the tyrant of the Moors, helping him to save his face and whatever dignity he had left. She didn’t lower her eyes to meet his; she merely continued to stroke him until his heartbeat slowed down once more. 

Then, she gently lay him down next to her, in her own nest, and lowered herself on her side next to him, facing him. Her dark hair pooled around her. 

He was so stunned that he couldn’t move a feather. He was still stunned when she wrapped her hand around him and pulled him close, chest against chest again, his entire frame nested in the curve of her body, of her arm and her belly and her legs as she curled herself around him. He didn’t dare to breathe. Was this real, or was this another creation of his confused mind?

"Don’t look at me like that”, Maleficent said, now sounding much more like his usual mistress which annoyed him and endeared him. “And don’t get used to this. It’s only this one time.”

Diaval didn’t know at that moment that years later, snuggled in her arms in this very nest, he would tease her about this moment- _remember when you told me it was only that one time?-_ and she would poke him in his side with her sharp fingernail, answering: _oh, hush, you incorrigible bird._ But now, he let out an amused chirrup. Reality it was. He rested his head over her neck, feeling her pulse and her warmth there. Basking in that warmth surrounding him, he continued his soft, quiet chirruping, which would easily be translated by any raven who would hear him. 

_Thank you. I love you. I love you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I love you, I love you, I love you_.

He went silent after a little while, lulled into drowsiness by the slow rise and fall of her chest and the regular beat of her heart against his body. But before he fell into peaceful sleep, he amused himself with replaying in his mind something that she had let slip in the midst of his panic. 

_My dear,_ she had said. _My dear bird. My dear. Dear_ …

Their hearts fell into a shared, steady rhythm, again feeling as is they were touching, and Diaval thought how it might have been a rough awakening, but it certainly payed off.


	8. Nothing at all

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A tie-in with my earlier story "Expectations", which I don't know how to link here, so I'll do it at the beginning of the chapter. Makeficent's POV, but much more detailed. Also, much more explicit.

[Expectations](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25572070), to see Diaval's (and less explicit) POV.

oOo

The irony of the fact that Stefan was, paradoxically, likely going to be the least affected by Aurora's fate, of all people who ever knew her, was not lost on Maleficent. 

That thought, which started as an irritating afterthought in the back of her mind when the beastie was very little, had grown into a gnawing, pestering, oppressive weight in her heart over the years. A weight she could never shake off, never take down, day or night. Where the plague on her soul was once her own miserable ground- ridden fate, it had of late evolved into something…else. 

She despised it. It shouldn’t have happened. The child’s supposed fate was supposed to bring her joy. She was the caster of curse; she could always lift it if she tried, couldn’t she? Of course she could. Why not feel joyous about it, then; about watching what her curse did to Stefan? Why was she feeling…gloomy about it instead? 

The curse was supposed to bring her delight. She should have enjoyed Stefan’s suffering, as she did at the very beginning. But he suffered for all the wrong reasons, if Diaval’s observations were anything to go by. Stefan was obsessed, and terrified, and mad, but…but not heartbroken. Even if the child died, he still wouldn’t be heartbroken, as Maleficent had been…back then. 

He was only preoccupied with the possible loss of power. Loss of life. Loss of...dignity, perhaps? Maybe?

But not the loss of his heart. And that was the only thing Maleficent wanted to tear apart from him.  
Instead of Stefan’s, other hearts would suffer. Queen Leila, that poor, ignorant creature, much more the victim of circumstances beyond her understanding than Maleficent had ever been, had been suffering ever since. If only the woman was evil. If only Diaval ever mentioned her being cruel, despicable like her husband; or at least too stupid and indifferent to care. But he didn’t. If anything, he always avoided the matter of the queen with deliberate care, and Maleficent knew him well enough to know what that meant. He was sparing her. He thought he was sparing his mistress.

The three idiotic pixies...would they mourn Aurora? Mourn her deeply? It was difficult to tell. They were fond of the child, certainly. But were they fond enough? The fondness of a parent, the kind that was unconditional and absolute, the kind that made one stay awake for nights, nourishing, consoling, calming, giving selflessly, relentlessly, always giving, never asking for anything in return, like that ridiculous raven...

There was no doubt at all who would suffer the most, mourn the most, if Aurora was to succumb to ill fate. The thought made Maleficent crumple within herself, her body banding forward as if in pain, both hands stiffly clutching her walking staff with bone- white, cold knuckles. At the end of the day, the princess born in excessive wealth, a daughter of a king, a goddaughter of magical beings, an heiress to the throne, the one whose birth was celebrated by hundreds, would be truly mourned only by one lonely, heartbroken raven.

And perhaps there would also be another creature, a crippled fairy who might or might not admit that the little beast... had not been entirely unlikeable. And that mismatched, mourning duo, each lost in their own grief or remorse, would likely drift apart after- 

No. No, no. This line of thoughts would lead her into very dangerous paths. Enough, enough of this wallowing in this...this melancholy. 

But the sight of Diaval, that silly bird in question, hovering high above, barely a little black dot on the sky, was making it difficult for her to think about anything but the fact how he was still watching after the child, even after having played with her and leaving her in the safety of her cottage. Currently he was monitoring a very particular spot in the far distance, spying with his sharp eyesight the area just out of the Moors where the girl resided with her three guardians, checking for any sign of trouble, just to make sure that everything was all right at the end of another day. Maleficent knew too well that he would want nothing more than to bring Aurora here, to the safety of their home, to put her to sleep in a snug little nest he would make for her, and likely to sit on her like he would on his own nestlings, cooing her asleep like a good father that he was.

The image of Diaval clucking like a mother hen, all puffed up, while sitting on the sleeping child’s shoulder, made Maleficent feel something dangerously close to endearment.

 _Enough_. Again, enough with such ridiculously melancholic thoughts. What was wrong with her? Was her own nesting cycle close by? Had six moons already passed since the last one? There was no other way to explain this disturbance in her...disposition. There was no point in imagining how Diaval would behave around the child if she would be brought in the Moors. Or how the little beast herself would react to their home.

Even if a tiniest bit of curiosity could not be denied.

No. Again, for goodness sake...simply... no. That would never happen. Never again. How many times did she need to be betrayed by a human? Abandoned by a friend? NO.

Diaval started to soar lower, making smaller and smaller circles as he descended, and she watched him with a pang of envy that never went away. Her nonexistent wings hurt.

But it was impossible to feel bitter at him for long; not when the warm gleam in his eyes greeted her as he landed at her feet and gave her an exaggerated bow, wings spread apart. The dangerous feeling of endearment was rather alarming now, with him this close.

“Stop making a fool of yourself. You spend too much time around humans”, she commented dryly. “I don’t want you picking up their ridiculous habits. You are a bird, not a peasant sniveling before a knight.”

The raven clicked his beak at her, utterly unperturbed. Obviously pleased with himself, he rose in the air again and landed on the top of her staff, and started to preen his wings.

“Do you expect me to drag your weight up to the tree? Away with you”, and she turned him into a man, with a bit more roughness around the edges of her magic than necessary. He landed on his feet with experienced expertise, though, so no fun for her there. 

“You could have let me finished”, he chided, tugging at his coat, rubbing his palms together, running briefly a hand through his windswept hair and slicking it away from his face. She rolled her eyes at him. 

“Good mood, as usual, I see”, he continued to play with fire. “You should have come along at the cottage today. She notices when the ‘nice shadow’ isn’t there, did I tell you that?”

“Not this afternoon, you didn’t.”

“Still, we had fun”, his huge grin brightened his entire face. His eyes glimmered like black riverstones at the memory. Maleficent, who was looking forward to easing her mind by teasing him and verbally sparring with him, didn’t need this. At this moment, the last thing she wanted from him was the reminder of how precious that child was. How much he loved her. How much he’d lose if...

“She hid her hairbands all over the garden, and I was to find them.” 

“How exciting.”

“Then we swapped. And she measured time to see who would be faster.” 

“What a challenge.” Was he deliberately ignoring Maleficent’s dry attitude, or was he so blinded by his love for the child that he truly didn’t notice? 

“She is getting more and more cunning, that hatchling, you know? I swear, something of a raven is rubbing off her.” his smile grew even more radiant, and Maleficent wondered why, oh why did she change him into a man now, and what on Earth was stopping her from turning him into a bird again? 

“No doubt.”

“Before I came, she had it all planned. She planted pieces of cheese to distract me, the sly little runt. And I was hungry. Still, she can’t measure up to a raven, of course. But she made a good opponent”, he grinned proudly. And he did have every reason to be proud, the fairy knew. She had helped to keep the girl alive when she was a little thing, running blindly into all kinds of danger, but Diaval taught her how to play. How to show affection. How to share. How to be kind. How to be smart. How to be careful, and when. How to find edible berries, and which mushrooms to stay away from. All this without a word, and without hands.

He would be an amazing father. He deserved a family of his own. But Maleficent robbed him off that possibility. And for all his complaining he never, ever showed a tiniest bit of resentment over that, even though he was so obviously made by Mother Nature to nurture little ones. And if- if she does let this curse to play itself- he is going to lose this one child he did get to love.

Maleficent felt bile rising in her throat.

“Mistress, I was thinking that for her next birthday, I might try and get another book from the castle. The one I brought last summer is all but falling apart, so many times she went through those- “

“Absolutely not!” Maleficent snapped. “Do I need to remind you what happened the last time you poked your beak into the library? Also, is there anything else you know how to talk about, except for that snotty little beast? You bore me to death! Either find an interesting topic for conversation, or I’ll have no need for that mouth of yours for the time being!”

He looked at her with those strange eyes, too black for a man, too expressive for an animal. He did have beautiful eyes, curse him, beautiful and soulful, impossibly expressive. She couldn’t bear to face what she saw there, so she fixed her stare into the abyss below their tree. Their tree? When did she come to think of it that way? Just because she allowed him to roost next to her- 

“Fine, mistress. How about ‘ _when is a certain fairy going to be kind to her wise servant, and why never?’_ How’s that?”

His voice wasn’t angry. If it only was. It would be so easy to tear him apart with her words then. But he was merely teasing her, with not a trace of hurt in his voice; he even smiled with that crooked, warm grin of his, leaning slightly towards her. Was he truly so brazen that her harsh words didn’t affect him, or was he simply a good pretender? 

“Don’t be daft. I am not kind to anyone. Why would you be an exception? Do you value yourself that much above all others?”

“What others?”

Her fists clenched and unclenched, once, slowly. His eyes, infuriatingly unafraid, traveled to the left, then to the right, encompassing the usual lack of any living soul in her presence, before he cocked an eyebrow and offered a sheepish smile. 

“Fair point”, she answered quietly, barely moving her lips. “Remind me again why do I need you, either? Certainly, there are less annoying ways to spy on the king.”

“Well, your voice, to start with”, he said, suddenly the picture of seriousness. 

“My voice? What is wrong with my voice?”

“Oh, nothing. It’s very beautiful. That’s the point.” his cheekbones grew slightly flushed, but he didn’t stop there. “That is thanks to me; to all of our enlightening conversations. If you were to endure the horror of a Diaval-less existence, your voice would go completely hoarse with the lack of use.”

“I could always talk to Balthasar and Lief.”

“Yes, they are such renowned conversationalists. _Mistress_.”

The smile crept on her face before she could stop it. It was tiny and it was there only for a moment, but the silly bird must have caught it, because he grinned back and leaned comparatively to her, as if about to share a secret: “And we both know that you owe your impeccable clothing style entirely to me. Imagine how would you look without my generous styling influence.”

“You mean, without you pestering me until I resign to wearing all black just to silence you?”

“That is one way to say that. The outcome is all the same.”

“I look like a black vulture.”

“Flawless.”

He laughed at her annoyed expression, and his inky hair fell into his eyes, and Maleficent fought the urge to brush it away, to tuck it behind his ear. But not now, not yet, not with him as a man. Even if she wondered if his hair was as smooth to touch as his feathers. Wondered would he melt again under her hand as he did in his bird form. Wondered if she would feel the same strange mixture of serenity and thrill at his reaction, at holding the entirety of his being in her hands, at being offered such trust. Would she see the same fervent adoration in his human eyes as she did in his raven ones? Would he unravel so completely, as he always did? 

She must have looked at him too intently, too long, because the blush on his cheekbones intensified. She allowed herself to smirk a little. It was comforting to know that she could arouse him so, to know that she had that power over him, even if he never acted upon it- whether from fear of respect, she didn’t know.

What she did know was the reason for which _she_ never acted upon it, and it wasn’t for the lack of her body’s response to him. 

Also, she had to remind herself of it now, immediately. Before she did something she would not be able to undo.

Remind herself what happened the last time she allowed herself to trust a man with her body. Remind herself that he was her servant, and she had no right to put him in a position in which he would think he’s obliged to lie down with her, even if he was likely to want it now. Remind herself that such act would likely disturb the precarious balance they had long established in their peculiar relationship. Remind herself that she didn’t want to have anybody to lose ever again. Remind herself that lust did not equal love, and that it was often difficult to tell the two apart. Remind herself that hearts could change, and even if he did think he liked her well enough to be at her side now, a change might come over him, and he might hate her one day. Especially if she would be the reason for his beloved fledgling’s demise.

Oh, wonderful. The beastie invaded her thoughts again, and with her, the oppressive feeling in her chest returned. Just when she had started to relax, somewhat.

"Mistress?” Diaval, of course, noticed the darkening of her expression. “Are you hurting?”

His eyes grew worried and he stopped goofing around immediately. Oh, why did he have to be that infuriatingly perceptive? She barely frowned a bit. “Of course I’m not hurting. Why would I be hurting?” 

“You are rubbing your chest”, he said, not convinced at all.

Oh. She felt such heaviness in her chest, she must have really rubbed it with her knuckles, a futile attempt at finding relief. “Am I not allowed to have an itch, now?”

“Is there a skin condition of yours that I’m not aware of?”

“Not unless I caught lice from you, in which case I am going to burn both of our nests, and I’m going to boil you and pluck you like a chicken.”

“Mistress!” he gaped at her in utter terror. Did she finally manage to frighten him? “Lice, me? Perish the- how could you even- whatever gave you the slightest idea that- how can you _possibly_ think that?”

Ah. So, he wasn’t appalled because of a threat of a slow, gruesome death; he was appalled by the thought that he might carry parasites. 

“How could you think that I would be so sloppy not to eat every single louse before it got out of hand? I’ll let you know that, when Aurora got lice, I was the first and the only one to- “

Maleficent felt her eyes widen in horror. “Aurora has _lice_?”

“Not anymore, and not thanks to any other but me!”

“You _ate_ them?”

“What was I supposed to do with them, pickle them? They are too tiny to be stored away for later.”

“Oh, my goodness. Why did I ask?” Maleficent buried her face in her hands. 

“Actually, I asked...”  
“Enough! Enough, _please_.” she growled it like a curse. “I think I have heard enough. You managed to tire me down.” She summoned the branches from her tree to make a staircase formation for her to climb up to her small residence, where their nests were hidden and most of their nights shared. 

Ever since Diaval had weaseled his way into her home, most of their nights were spent together, each in their own nests. Except in those rare occasions when there was a logical reason for him to join her in her own. It was logical, after all, to have him calmed down after one of them had a bad dream- what was the point of trying to rest next to a fidgeting bird? It was logical for him to be next to her after he had been injured, for what good was an unwell servant to her? She had to monitor him closely. Also, it was logical for them both to share the heat in the coldest winter days. Why waste her energy on magical maintenance of temperature, when they could be warm without her overtaxing herself? That was the whole point of a servant, wasn’t it? And if she had felt a little bit of affection for him in the process, if she did take a bit of enjoyment in the touch of his warm feathers and the purring sound from his chest, from the sensation of his strong, fast heartbeat against her skin, there was no damage in that, as long as he wasn’t aware of it. His head was big enough as it was.

“I am going to retire early”, she announced, probably unnecessarily, as it was rather obvious from her disappearance in the thick canopy. “Are you done with your yammering for today?”

She could hear him fidgeting uneasily down below. “I have to ask, mistress, are you truly all right? You wouldn’t keep some ailment from me, now would you?”

“Why would I do such a stupid thing?”

“It’s not stupid”, he protested. “It’s rather wise, actually. Why let all the predators in vicinity know that one is ailing? A bird might just as well hang a sign ‘easy prey’ on their neck. Keep up the appearances as long as you can; that’s what every bird knows from the day it hatches from an egg.”

“Well, I am not a bird, you are not a predator- “

“Actually- “

“- and I’m not keeping any ailment from you. Now, do you want to be a bird now, or would you prefer to sleep as a man later, somewhere out there? Because if you wake me up in a few hours, wanting to sleep here- “

“You know I would only want to help”, he ignored her question entirely. “If you are ill, or something.”

“For the last time, you obtuse devourer of lice, I am not ill!”

“My brother didn’t want to show, either. He...”

The sudden silence had her actually peeking out of the entrance to her home, checking if he had dropped unconscious, or the underground guardians snatched him, as unlikely as it was. Neither proved to be true. He was still close by, but apparently walking slowly away, looking behind at their tree, uncertain what to do. The sudden vulnerability in his stance made her heart ache again, and that, in turn, made her angry at herself.

She wanted to scold him, though for what, she didn’t know. She wanted to yell at him to go away, to leave her to her well- deserved nightmares for once, to take his knowledgeable eyes and his feathered hair and his stories about Aurora elsewhere.

Instead, she lowered the branches for him to climb up, too. 

When he merely remained standing and staring in obvious surprise, she called impatiently: “Well, do hurry up, will you?”

“But...” he almost stuttered, all of his boastful confidence from earlier vanishing in thin air. “Won’t you turn me back?”

“I will, eventually. But I can see you are not done talking, and I have learned that anything I might not hear now, I will certainly have to hear the very next time I turn you back into a man. So, I might just as well be done with it now. Climb up.”

He did. 

Seeing him peek carefully inside like he’d never been there before almost made her smile. He had rarely been here as a man before, and she had to remind herself that this was Diaval, the same person who slept in this very chamber every night, only he looked different now; Diaval, whom she had known for a decade now; Diaval, who had given his oath to her, and never broke it. 

“Well, this place looks much more cramped when I’m not a bird”, he rubbed his hands nervously.

“If you are complaining about the home I so generously provided you with, you can just as well move back outside. I hear this winter will be very...white. Very snowy. Lovely, certainly.”

“Not complaining, mistress. Observing. I’m an observant bird. That’s why you have me around, isn’t it?” tilting his head, he sat himself carefully on the uneven flooring. 

“Wasn’t it because of your oratory skills and impeccable clothing taste?”

“My qualities are many.”

“Modesty high among them, no doubt.” she produced a bowl full of black nuts and dried grapes from her storage and set it between them on the floor. Diaval’s hand was after the food before the bowl was set down, and Maleficent slapped his greedy fingers away. “Manners, you glutton. How come you have picked all kinds of irritating customs from humans, but not basic manners?”

“Oh, I did pick them up quite well. I just didn’t bother now”, he rubbed his assaulted fingers. 

“You must be a veritable gentleman”, she said dryly.

“I am, if you must know. I might even teach you a thing or two. The greeting, the curtsy...”

She laughed shortly at his silliness. Yes, _that_ was likely to ever happen, surely.

They were silent as they ate- or, in Diaval’s case, shoved the food down the throat. Maleficent, cringing, had to remind him to chew; he still tended to forget that detail in his man-form.

“I am going to regret calling you here in this clumsy form”, she chided.

Diaval wiped his mouth with his sleeve, eyeing her sideways. “Why _did_ you call me here in this clumsy form, mistress?”

What should she tell him? She wasn’t certain of the answer herself. Should she tell him that she was curious at the mention of his brother? That she loved to hear his raspy, quiet voice, that it lulled her into a sense of serenity? That she felt a pang of guilt, seeing him walking away, worried and wingless as he was? That she was feeling almost physically sick at the thought of Aurora’s possible demise (no, no, she could always revoke the curse; of course she could, why did that ridiculous worry keep coming?) and what the girl’s passing (there will be no passing) would do to Diaval? That she wanted to retreat in the safety and comfort of her (their) home, and for some infuriating reason, the feeling of safety was never quite complete without him there? That she longed for the hypnotic effect that the petting of his bird form had on them both, but right now, she wanted his silly words and lopsided smile more?

“I’m bored”, she said flatly.

“I could sing for you, but I seem to remember- “

“NO!” and then, amused at his aggravated expression, softer: “No need. Tell me about your brother. The one you mentioned.”

Only upon saying those words Maleficent thought that it might lead them into uncomfortable emotional territories. But it was too late, it was bound to be less heart-wrenching than talking about Aurora, and she was curious. She knew Diaval had been a part of a huge unkindness of youngsters right before he had met her, which meant he hadn’t been bonded with a mate; she knew he had siblings, which had joined that same unkindness along with him, but he rarely spoke of those times. She wondered if perhaps he was forgetting it; forgetting the times when his brain worked differently, when his mind was simpler, when he was driven more by instinct than by reason and emotion. 

“Why the sudden interest?” he asked, strangely guarded. 

“I’m bored”, she repeated. If she repeats the lie enough times, she might even start believing in it.  
Diaval stopped eating. He shifted where he was sitting, cross- legged, and observed his thick, dark fingernails which ended in sharp points, a strange amalgam between his raven and human self.

When Maleficent thought he wasn’t going to answer, he spoke: “The opinion on my brother was divided. The whole unkindness was of the impression that he was a huge pain in the butt. He, on the other hand, was of the opposite conviction.”

Ah, so she had been wrong. He remembered- remembered everything. It wasn’t easy for Maleficent to suppress a chuckle. Apparently, the high opinion on one own self was hereditary in that clutch. 

“He had those silly things always happening to him…you know, the kind of things that can happen to anybody, but just somehow happened only to him.”

“Like getting caught in a farmer’s net and being turned into a human by a fairy?” Maleficent couldn’t resist, and Diaval clicked his tongue disapprovingly at the interruption: “Like trying to rob the eagle’s nest off its nestlings, thinking they would be an easy prey, and nearly getting eaten by them, escaping with an inch of his life and half of his flight feathers missing. Or, digging about cow’s dung for flies and ending up with a big, fresh piece of dung being delivered right on him. He nearly drowned in it.”

Against her will, Maleficent felt her lips stretching into a wide grin, revealing all of her sharp teeth. Diaval must have been encouraged by it, because he responded with that crooked, warm smile of his own, and a glimmer in his midnight eyes. “Can you imagine the smell? No matter how many baths he took, he couldn’t get rid of it. The first night in the roost after that, the entire unkindness huddled on one side of the glen, and he remained alone on the other side.” Diaval kept staring at his talon- nails. “Well, alone except for me. Though I wasn’t keen on getting too close, either. Our sisters, they couldn’t get far enough from us. Not that we blamed them. They were both courted by some promising young fellows at the time, finally about to leave the unkindness if they form mating pairs. They couldn’t risk becoming suddenly undesirable by associating with some stinky runts, even if those runts are their brothers.”

“I assume he was the youngest of all, troublesome as he was?”

“Oh, no. He was the oldest, a whole year older than the three of us. But he was what one might call a late bloomer. He remained mostly at our parents’ side even after they got a new clutch, yours truly among the new hatchlings. He actually helped raising us, and didn’t quite join the unkindness properly until the three of us fledged.”

“Ah. A bit slow in the mind, then?”

Diaval stared at her down his long, pointed nose. “He was very smart. He knew how to imitate every single voice or sound he’d ever heard. He sometimes distracted the farmers by making the sound of a screaming human, or a sheep or a cow, and while they were investigating what the heck have they just heard, we others would liberate them of their food right behind their backs.” He smiled fondly at the memory, and Maleficent again felt the strong surge of an irritably warm feeling in her chest. To quench it, she retorted dryly: “My, my, I wonder why those farmers were so bent on clubbing you into oblivion.”

“Our sisters were worse. The boldness with which they stole- I swear, I could never be that brave. They approached human dwellings, and one of them would pull a cat’s tail, while another would snatch a mouse right out of the cat’s paws. If there was a fisherman at the river, they would wait until he’s made a catch, and just when he’d take a fish off the hook, one of them would dive at him, while the other would take off with a fish in her beak. They were inseparable, until the found mates.”

“What became of them all?”

She was a bit hesitant to ask; yet, she couldn’t hold back. Curses, she should really not care…but she did. She was curious; curious about her companion’s past, his family, his whole endearing, caring, infuriating person. 

_I shouldn’t be doing this. I have allowed myself to go too far already. Nothing lasts forever. Not friendship. Not infatuation. Not lust. Sooner or later, he won’t be around anymore, and I will grieve again, if I let this…_

On his part, Diaval was hesitant to answer. She had definitely never seen him that fascinated with his finger talons.

“My brother, an illness, which he hid well. He…”

Stopping, he clenched his jaws tight, and Maleficent saw just how wrong she had been about him maybe forgetting his early life. Not only he didn’t forget; he still mourned the brother he obviously adored. The brother who sounded to have been a lot like Diaval; a runt, too clever, too caring, too odd. 

To her horror, Maleficent thought she saw Diaval’s eyes growing impossibly bright, reddening at the corners, and she almost bolted away.

No, no, no. Not the tears; not his tears. Not these _feelings_. She wasn’t going to- what should she do if- 

“My sisters are still around. Respectable, majestic ladies with successful clutches of chicks each year. The number of nephews and nieces I have”, he flashed her a smile, and she wanted to reach out and wipe away those tears, thankfully unshed, which still glimmered in his eyes. His eyes were even more beautiful like that, if possible, bottomless and glittering, and Maleficent wondered if he was aware of it. If he was doing this on purpose to her.

“So only the three of you in the clutch that year, then?” she said, only to say something, to stop herself from giving in the temptation to feel the touch of his feathered hair and his human skin under her fingers, to comfort him in this form as she did in his bird’s one.

“Well, no. There had been more- one more sister. But she didn’t live long enough to…”

He trailed away again, and she had the urge to smack herself over her head with her walking staff, if she hadn’t been too dignified for that. Perhaps she should smack _him_ over the head with that thing. The desire to reach out and caress his pain away, as she did once, long ago, when she nearly killed him in a blind frenzy of panic after waking up from a nightmare, was becoming overwhelming. 

She never forgot. She could never forget the night she had learned that he was keeping her violent dreams under control with his presence, with his voice, with the soft warbles of a raven. Could he do the same as a man?

 _Stop. Stop, you silly fairy. Get up, send him away, do anything but this. This is dangerous. For both of you_.

But she continued to sit next to him, still as death, as he talked about still keeping an eye on his remaining family, occasionally helping them by placing food where they could find it or chasing away the danger from them, because he loved them still, the ridiculous bird, even as he admitted- when she specifically asked him- that they didn’t return the sentiment.

“I don’t think they recognize me as their kin anymore”, he admitted in a voice so low, so heavy with sorrow that Maleficent turned to look him straight in the eye, knowing full well that she’d find him open and vulnerable for her, trusting her not to tear him apart. Trusting her like he had, maybe, trusted his accursed family once. Trusted her, like she had once trusted Stefan. Silly bird. Wasn’t he presented with enough proof, through his own experience and hers, that love was a fickle, illusory feeling, bringing nothing but pain; that nothing that was loved could ultimately be kept?

“How come?” she asked, even if she knew too well. She searched for resentment in his eyes, for anger, for hate, bracing herself for it. It was her fault. All hers. She had not only robbed him off any hypothetical future family he might have had; she had alienated him from his original family as well. A family, something he so obviously craved, needed, ached for, and he’ll never have it because of her. And even that little girl…

But there was no hatred in his warm eyes as he explained how the change in him frightened them, made him a stranger to them. Only sorrow, and acceptance. And tears- curse him, curse his tears, why couldn’t he just despise her already, so she could erase him from her heart as she did to Stefan and Robin and be done with it?

“I am sorry”, she managed to say without a tremor in her voice. She didn’t lie. She was sorry for Diaval and his too- open heart which still believed in love, for his brother, for little Aurora, for her poor mother, for the innocent boy Stefan once was, for a young fairy which once believed in love and friendship just like Diaval did now. Sorrow resolved nothing, but she was sorry nonetheless. 

But the silly bird, in pain as he was, said that it was all right, and offered her a smile, that soft, warm smile of his that had her snapping at him numerous times, because it was either snapping at him, or reaching out to caress him. She should snap out at him now, she thought. But before she could think of something appropriately scolding, he kept explaining how he was actually more useful to them this way, and it was, apparently a good thing, somehow. She didn’t hide her confusion – what on Earth could he possibly gain by such one- sided relationship?

"That's how love works. I'm happy that I can help, and that they breathe under the same sky as me. Otherwise it would be a trade, not love, if I gave only what I expected to have repaid."

This angered her- angered her and touched her, and she didn’t wasn’t to be touched, but the anger was welcome. He should expect something back. He should. Nothing was ever free, nothing gained without a loss, and that silly bird was just giving out his heart freely, to his dumb family, to Aurora, to herself, and she couldn’t afford to believe that such thing existed. 

“Is that why you have tears in your eyes as we speak? For all the happiness you feel?” she snapped, hoping to hit where it hurts.

She did. He tensed visibly, and the glistening in his eyes became obvious even as he turned them away from Maleficent. His eyelids and cheekbones were red, flushed, and she realized that hurting him didn’t make her feel any better. Quite the contrary; her insides churned and her own face felt alarmingly warm. Her fingers clutched her robes in an attempt to snuff out the renewed urge to run her hand through his hair, to caress his temple, to feel his pulse on his human skin, as she did that one time, years back, the night she made him a nest in her home and welcomed him inside. He sighed and closed his eyes then, and she’d pulled her hand back, before she did something stupid beyond comprehension. Would he react the same now?

She knew his body…reacted to hers. But that meant absolutely nothing. He was a male, always; a man, sometimes, and in any case, not a particularly safe to assume his emotions on his physical…responses. Heck, her own body wasn’t very trustworthy on that matter, as it tended to do silly things concerning Diaval, sometimes. It was only a bit of lust, nothing more, and she teased him for it, though the teasing sometimes almost got the better of her. Like that time they engaged in a tickle war. That was close. Silly, foolish weakness of flesh, born out of instinct and loneliness.

But that touch of his face on her hand, that little sigh that escaped him…how could she still remember it so vividly after all this time?

 _He’s a servant. A servant. Remember yourself_.

He does things that he’s not required to by his fealty. His service was given out of his free will. Could he be a bit of a friend too, now, couldn’t he? 

_Friendships end. Robin was a friend. Stefan was a friend once. There were many friends once, and where are they now? They didn’t even try. Not even Robin. They just disappeared_.

True, they fled when hardship came along. But all this ridiculous creature goes through with you is hardship and loss. And yet, he remains, unwavering. 

_For how long?_

A decade now. How much longer do you need?

_It doesn’t matter. It will end, one day, this misplaced devotion in his eyes. One day, he’ll see me for a monster that I am, and he’ll hate me for everything I did to him._

Even if he’s such a ridiculous creature, believing in unconditional love and goodness in hearts of evil fairies?

“I miss touching, though.”  
At his voice, she spun around as if he’s slapped her. It wasn’t the first time his words mirrored her thoughts somehow, and she wondered if he was a concealed mind-reader, or he knew how to read her so well, or- the most frightening of all- if their minds somehow followed similar paths, despite all their stark differences?

“Preening and…such”, he added, a bit tensely.   
She continued to stare at him, trying to find something acerbic to say, but all she could think of was ‘ _me, too’_. And her mind readily offered all the memories of them exchanging touches- helping touches, healing touches, teasing, pecking, caressing, feathers and skin leaning into one another, almost getting to the point they craved but not quite.

 _Me, too, you silly bird_.

The tears he was valiantly fighting back finally won over. One rolled down his flushed cheekbone, then another, and his eyelids fluttered down, black eyelashes hiding the offending wetness. 

She should scold him now for his foolish sentimentality. She should yell at him; mock him, even better. Perhaps this sickening, hot churning in the pit of her stomach would ebb away, and his tears would mean nothing to her. Those cursed tears from those faithful, intelligent eyes which never turned away from her in disgust, not even when she was on her absolute lowest possible bottom.

Her hand, cold with trepidation, moved on its own accord. It touched the wet trail on his warm skin, wiping the tear away, and he stopped breathing. His cheek was very warm and very soft, a trace of a stubble barely palpable. Her heart was running, running wild; she hoped he couldn’t hear it. She caught his scent now; dry, dusty scent of feathers, predominant in his bird form, and something heavier, muskier underneath. He sighed, barely noticeable, and ever so slightly, finally leaned in her palm. 

“Am I not touching you sometimes? I seem to recall that you quite enjoy when I stroke your feathers, if your purring is any giveaway.”

“You are, mistress. Sometimes.” 

There was a longing in that last whisper, and his eyes were stormy with emotion. Her breath against her hand sent goosebumps all over her skin, a tickling warmth building up in between her legs. She pulled her hand back before she did something she could never undo, and just watched him. He was looking back, leaning towards her, unmoving, arms apart as if offering himself.

 _Take me,_ he seemed to be saying _. Take me, mistress. You have all of me anyway. What else do I have other than you? I no longer have a family. I no longer belong to my own kind. I have no other place but at your side. You have nobody but me. Take me. Let us have this, let us be just a little less lonely together._

And was this truly what she saw in his unspoken message, or was she just projecting her own thoughts and needs on him? 

_Stop this. Stop this now. If you don’t stop this now, there will be no turning back_. 

He yet had to move an inch. But his eyes, his eyes spoke to her and didn’t lie. Perhaps one day he’ll truly leave her. Everybody did. He was much more resilient than the rest, she’d give him that, but it was unavoidable. But for now, his heart was still pure, his emotion raw, innocent. 

“Your heart is way too kind for your own good, Diaval”, she heard her own voice, and then saw her own hand reaching out for his face again.

_Stop, stop_

There were still traces of tears and she wiped them away. She couldn’t stand them; they were hurting her, twisting her inside out. If they are gone, perhaps her self- control will decide to finally step up. 

No such luck. Her fingers searched his hair behind his temples, and she felt the feathers there fluff up. He closed his expressive eyes and sighed, eliciting another wave of searing hotness on a very sensitive place of her anatomy. Oh, he loved it, loved it as he did in his bird shape, and she knew she could do anything she wanted with him. But how could she hide from him that he had the same power over her?

_Stop now. This is a point of no return. Stop. Aren’t you tired of loss and heartbreak?_

Apparently not, because she heard her traitorous voice asking: “I suppose you also miss mating kind of touch?”

He opened his eyes to look at her, and they were glazed over now, almost feverish. Under her fingertips, she could feel the pulse on his neck. It was frantic.

“Can’t really miss what I never had”, his raspy voice made her bite the inside of her cheek. 

“You never mated?” she really hoped she wasn’t going to hear that she’d tore him away from a mate and the younglings, but she was almost entirely certain that wasn’t the case. A creature with such love for his family, even for a human offspring- there was no way he’d be so forgiving. 

“No, mistress.” Nevertheless, it was reassuring to hear that cleared out loud and clear from his mouth. “Was too young. And now…”

_And now, you are mine. Mine to have. Mine to mark you as my own. All mine._

The thought was incredibly arousing. 

“Not even a quick roll with some bypassing, pretty she-raven at some hot summer afternoon, no obligations?” she teased him. She always loved teasing him, she loved the power she had over him, and she knew that he knew, even if they never spoke of it, and she knew that he knew that she knew…but she got tangled in her own web now, and could not entangle herself from him anymore. Not with him rolling his eyes at her to show exactly what he meant of that idea, before leaning his cheek in her palm with a yearning sigh, his black eyelashes fluttering close again. Every feather on his head stood up, and had he been in his original form, his whole head would be fluffy like a kitten’s fur; not that he would like the comparison. His cheek pressed gently in her palm, asking for more, probably for her fingernails to reach his skin through his hair and scratch him there, and she complied. At that, he moaned, a sound so quiet but so raw with pleasure, and the warm pulsing in her sensitive area made it impossible for her to remain still any longer. 

_Stop, please, stop_ …

Oh, shut up, she cut herself off.

“Well, apparently, it falls to me that I have to teach you everything”, she mustered the strength to say in a voice purposefully steady and _not_ high-pitched. She did allow herself an overbearing sigh, as if about to perform a taxing, if necessary duty.

He looked at her, eyes flashing open, and for the first time ever in his human form, she noticed his pupils, barely discernible from his dark, dark irises, wildly dilating and narrowing, as they did in his raven shape when he was excited beyond control. She wondered what others peculiarities his human body carried; she remembered how he stood before her when she first changed him- naked, dirty, unashamed- remembered those times he’d disrobed, unashamed still, to bathe or swim in the river, though ‘swimming’ was a bit if a stretch with him; ‘floating’ or ‘trying not to drown’ would be more accurate- and she knew how he looked then, relaxed and calm. 

She wanted to know how he looked like now, how the rest of his body looked like below those flushed cheeks and sharp collarbones. But she needed to make something clear; she couldn’t leave it to assumption.

“However, you are not expected to comply. This is not something you are obliged to do. I want you to understand this. Am I perfectly clear, Diaval?”

His answer was a hand that was shaking slightly as he reached for her cheek, and his rough fingers caressed her with the gentleness of a feather. The touch sent a currant of heat through her throat and belly, ending low in her body, in a heap of pulsing warmth. It almost blinded her, making her set aside all pretenses of self- control. She lay her hand over his to move his nervous, exploring fingers away from her face, bringing them with desperate urge down, underneath her robes she was tugging up with her other hand, right between her legs, in the needy wetness there. 

He inhaled audibly, leaning into her, steading himself with his arm on her shoulder. Her entire body was trembling, and so did his. 

“Mistress”, he whispered in her pointy ear, and again, her skin tingled where his breath caressed her. Oh, goodness, she needed to calm herself down a bit; she couldn’t allow to lose control this much. “you should know that I have absolutely no idea what am I doing.”

His honest nervousness was welcome and calming, exactly what she needed to reassure herself. He was out of his wits, too; excited beyond all measure, and terrified even more than she was. The roughness of his taloned fingers on her entrance was so gentle, so promising, so exciting, so teasing, and so completely missing the target. Her experience was limited to one person before him, but his own was nonexistent, and that was more exciting than any courtship ritual she had ever heard or witnessed to exist, in human or fairy or raven world.

“Oh, don’t worry. I won’t leave you directionless, and I expect you to be an apt learner.”

Apparently, that left him speechless. She smiled in a best attempt to encourage him as she moved around to help him find what she wanted him to find. She ran her hand under his coat and tugged it away from his shoulders. He pulled his hand away from her, to her regret, to shake the coat off completely from him, and she took the opportunity to seize him by the shirt and pull him to his feet with her. Her knees felt weak and she stumbled back, pulling them both in her large nest, hoping that it came off as a deliberate seductive act rather than a clumsy one that it was.

To distract him from guessing that, she reached down for the part of his anatomy she was very curious about, finding it stone- hard through his trousers. He hissed through his teeth, closed his eyes, buried his face in the crook of her neck. She inhaled his scent, feathers and skin, allowing herself to get drunk by it. 

“Careful, mistress”, he nuzzled around her ear, “or I might be done before we properly started.”

She crooked her neck to look him in the eye. It twinkled back at her warmly, and a little bit mischievously. “And what would you know about such things, cheeky bird, if you are so innocent as you say?”

“I never said I was innocent”, he smiled sweetly. Obviously, his brain had stirred from his lust- induced stupor, and he was getting his infuriating, adorable wittiness back. “Merely inexperienced. But I do see and hear things, among humans. And I did have a lot of…solitary practice.”

Maleficent bit her lip at the mental image, and thought of her own numerous solitary practices, often fantasizing about his hands doing the work instead of her own. Perhaps they both exercised their solitary practices at the same time, each in their own fantasies of the other one. 

“Well, let’s put that knowledge to use, shall we?” she pulled at the edges of his shirt, having him being rid of it, while he slowly, reverently worked at the laces and buttons of her robes and skirts. He was clumsy with that, he always had been with those pesky little things, but she didn’t mind; much more important was how careful he was, how closely he observed her reactions to see if she was all right with what he was doing. He sighed audibly when her small breasts were exposed, leaning down to press his lips against one.

“As you wish, mistress”, he murmured, lips teasing the sensitive spot there. Despite the thrill it sent down her belly, she felt that she had to remind him: “You don’t have to do anything I wish, here in the nest, silly, unless you wish it too. Your fealty doesn’t extend this far. Understand that.”

“But I wish”, he shot her a look that was almost alarmed. “Oh, I wish. I wish. Let me- please…”

He pressed a soft kiss on her breast, then again, and again, with fervent eagerness. When he didn’t seem to have any intention of stopping, she chuckled:

“What are you doing there, naughty bird?”

“Kissing”, he looked up, and the expression on his face, sheer adoration mixed with joy and disbelief, was one that Maleficent will never forget. She had never been given such look from anybody, ever, and she almost teared up at it. “I’ve never kissed anybody before. I’m waiting to see if I’ll wake up. This is…this is really happening, right?”

Yes, the silly bird had her tearing up. Damn him, damn his eyes, damn his touch, and his innocence, and this expression on his face which might have been love, if such thing existed.

“It is happening”, she confirmed. “Of course, provided that you stop staring, and keep doing what you were doing.”

“Right. Right”, he pulled himself together and resumed his ministrations on her breasts. Seeing him hesitate a bit, she guessed that he was unsure how to proceed, and she instructed: “ Lower.”

Lower he went. 

“ _Lower_ ”, she growled. He looked up, that silly, lopsided grin on his face. “You mean…ah. Why don’t you just say so.”

“If it’s not disagree…oh.”

He took away her power of coherent speech with what he did next, but her mind remained clear enough to take notice of the fact that their lips hadn’t met. And she decided it would remain that way. The first time she lay down with a man, on her sixteenth birthday, she’d been kissed for the first time- a true love’s kiss, it was supposed to be- and it ended how it ended. And while she was fairly certain that Diaval wasn’t about to betray her so cruelly, while her mind subconsciously catalogued each of the numerous differences between Stefan and Diaval, she still didn’t want that deceitful, dangerous touch on her lips. Anywhere but the lips.

There was no danger of that at the moment, however, because her companion’s mouth was very busy on the exactly opposite end of her body, and damn him, did he pick up every minute sigh, tremor and twitch of her body with frightening acuity, and modified his movements accordingly. When he struggled, she instructed him, her voice strange and hoarse in her ears. _Gentler. Harder. Left. My left, silly bird. Tongue. Lips. Fingers. There. Not there. Yes. Yes, yes_.

She knew she must be hurting him, digging her talons in his scalp when white light erupted behind her eyes, when she convulsed under him, unable to hold back a moan that came out more as a scream which all fairy creatures within half a mile were bound to hear. Diaval didn’t stop there; he gripped her thighs, wrapped around his shoulders, and his talons came just short of making the marks of their own there. He didn’t stop, and she writhed in his arms as the bolts of white lightning continued to pulse through her eyes, her spine, her lower belly. He didn’t stop until she pulled at his hair and growled: “ _Stop_.”

He did, immediately, and he crawled up to look at her face as she tried to get her breathing, her pulse, her voice and her general self under some semblance of control. “Mistress?”

The hesitation in his voice forced her to open her eyes and face his worried expression. Simultaneously, he was licking his lips in the very same manner he did when he ate something especially tasty, and he looked ravenous. His eyes were wide like saucers. Even in her post- climactic haze, Maleficent found the strange amalgam of expressions incredibly exciting.

“ ‘m fine, more than fine”, she said through a throat hoarse from moaning and screaming. “Silly, dear bird.” She run her hand through his thick, black locks, now in complete and uncharacteristic disarray. There was blood on her talons. “I hurt you. I’m sorry.” 

“I felt nothing”, he assured her as she quickly healed his scratches, and she hoped he didn’t lie. However, it came to her attention that he was now in a perfect position to kiss her, and if the way he was eyeing her lips was any indication, he was realizing that himself. And she couldn’t let that happen. 

She seized his shoulders, pushed him back into the nest and whirled around to crouch on top of him, switching their positions. Diaval let out a surprised yelp, but failed to show any trace of fear she had expected him to present. Instead, he gave her a wide grin, his pupils doing that funny birdish dance, and purred like a cat that ate, well, a bird.

“Let’s make you feel something, then”, she whispered, unlacing the string on his trousers and making him hiss again when she reached for him there. He was unsurprisingly firm as stone, and surprisingly warm; hot, even. She had to chuckle upon realizing that he had soft, downy black feathers mixed with coarse dark curls there. 

“Ah, now you mock me, when you had your fun”, he grinned. She could see his scarred chest reverberating with his frantic heartbeat, saw him swallowing, licking his lips, and she knew that he was terrified, for all his joking manner. Which was good, because, curse it, she was terrified too. 

“I’m liking what I see, vain creature.” She straddled him with her thighs, aware of his hands that caressed her sides, her forearms, her breasts, but never went anywhere near her back. She was grateful for that. A memory flashed in her mind- years ago, a raven-turned- man whom she had barely known helping her to tend to her debilitating injuries, assuring her that while he liked her front bumps better, he didn’t mind the stumps on her back either. Would he mind them now, if she’d let him to touch them?

Not worth the risk. Also, he was rather focused on her front bumps, as he had called them, so why bother. His palms were rough, but the touch was gentle, and it was welcome on the soft skin of her breasts. She rocked a bit, back and forth, crouched over him like that, and wondered how come he hadn’t tried to enter her already. All he had to do was to find the angle. Stefan was certainly ever interested about getting there as soon as possible. 

“Lost your tongue?” she ran a sharp talon over his lips to hide her uncertainty about how exactly to continue. Her experience was limited to one rather hurried man who always did everything quickly and always with her beneath him, even if her wings were sometimes uncomfortable. 

“Enjoying myself”, Diaval answered softly, reaching for her hair and tucking it behind her pointed ear. 

“But I am not doing anything”, she just had to point out. “Isn’t the act of mating the ultimate goal of what we’re fumbling with here for you males?” 

He shrugged, wriggling beneath her and sighing contentedly. “Not for this male. And not for birds. This is important, what we’re doing now.” He licked his lips again. “Tell me what you need, mistress. Show me. I’ll do anything- anything you need.”

Hs words made her feel silly and giddy at the same time. 

“You already did.”

With that, she reached down to align their corresponding anatomy parts, and watched for his reaction. It was unmistakable. He arched back, hissing, gripping at her thighs, and the manifestation of power she had over him refueled her confidence.

“Not important, huh?” She smirked.

“I didn’t say…” he fidgeted underneath her. “I said it’s not the ultimate…” he trailed away and hissed again when she rubbed herself against him, but not before uttering something very much alike ‘ _smart-arse_ ’.

“What was that, hmmm?” 

“Smart, wise mistress”, he lied, now quite high-strung. He reached down to adjust himself better at what he obviously assumed to be the right entrance, and for all her love of teasing him, she couldn’t find it in her heart to inform him that he was experimenting far too behind, with a wrong place. “Mistress…may I?”

The question, spoken in that hushed, raspy voice, combined with that feverish, adoring look in his eyes made her feel funny things where their bodies met again.

 _Yes_ , she whispered in his ear, and moved back to place him at the right entrance. 

“Here, silly bird”, she guided him, and couldn’t help but stroke his hair fondly.

“Oh. Sorry”, he smiled sheepishly. “Stupid human body. Birds are much more practic….aaaah.”

Maleficent let out a groan of her own, closing her eyes and taking a deep, shaky breath. She had long grown unaccustomed to that feeling, having a mate inside her, and it was both painful and thrilling. 

“Are you hurting?” She heard Diaval’s anxious voice, and she shook her head no. She wasn’t hurting _much_ , and if she admits to that overbearing bird that he gave her as much as a pinch, he would instantly bolt away. And cruel as she was, she didn’t want to do that to him on his very first time ever.

Now, easing oneself on top on another was easy enough, and after a moment of adjustment, the pain was gone, too. But moving in some semblance of rhythm, that was another matter entirely. Maleficent tried- wholeheartedly tried- but either her hips were too stiff, or her spine wasn’t flexible enough, or she was simply too uncoordinated to maintain the rhythm, or even establishing it in the first place. She made an attempt of a few thrusts in a way that rewarded her with Diaval’s hisses and moans and his head thrown back in bliss, but as exciting as it was, her hips and back couldn’t maintain that particular angle. 

_Oh, come on. It cannot possibly be that difficult to achieve. Back, forth, back- literally all creatures that breathe air can do it; what am I doing wrong?_

She tried to find the motion that didn’t make her joints protest, sliding rather than thrusting, but while Diaval’s expression was still blissful and hazy with pleasure, it was obvious that it didn’t have the same extatic effect as the one she couldn’t maintain. Frustrated, she tried to change the angle again, to make it better for him, but she managed three or four thrusts before her hips cracked in agony. Sweat erupted on her back and belly. If they were to finish this, she won’t be able to be in this position, no matter how powerful it made her feel.

And Diaval, the observant bird-man that he was, noticed her discomfort and took it to his heart, because of course he did. He gently placed his hands on her shoulders to stop her from trying any further. “Mistress, as much as I enjoy this, I enjoy much more when you are not in pain. If you wish, perhaps we could swi…”

“Not a word!” she said sternly, bumping his pointy nose with her finger. He looked, cross-eyed, at the long talon which came about half an inch from his eyes, and Maleficent found it hard to remain frowned at his silly expression. But she managed. “It _occurred to me_ that perhaps we could switch places.”

“What a wonderful idea, mistress. I never would have thought of it.”

She glared at him while dismounting him, and it was her turn to mumble ‘ _smart-arse_ ’. She was cold now here his body left hers, and her insides protested at the sudden emptiness, but her hips and back were incredibly grateful. For his part, Diaval didn’t show any disappointment; rather, he picked up his clothes and folded them into a pillow, placing them for her to lay her back on. 

“Here”, he offered sheepishly, and she again felt that worrying wave of warm feeling in her chest, seeing him trying to make the situation easier for her. Of course he was very aware of her stumps throughout this affair, and while it was entirely unnecessary for him to make her nest softer for her with a makeshift pillow- she could magic as many soft leaves as she needed to grow instantly- something inside her emotionally inept mind told her to refrain from pointing that out to him. The silly bird apparently didn’t mind making the loss of his virginity all about her, somehow, but he would mind her refusing that pointless heap of black rags. Ridiculous, dear creature.

She wished he wasn’t so attentive, so careful. So bloody selfless. Because it was making her feel even worse about what she was going to tell him. Turning carefully so he wouldn’t have to look at the ugliness on her back, reclining slowly back on his carefully placed clothes, her heart was hammering faster and faster with trepidation which this surrender of power awoke in her, and she wanted very much not to need telling this, but she did. 

“Don’t try to kiss me on the lips.”

If there was a pause from him at that request, it was barely noticeable. If he was disappointed, offended, he managed to hide it completely.

If only he would yell. Then she would know exactly how to react.

“Of course”, he answered quickly, almost immediately. Cocking his eyebrow inquiringly, he continued, now with a concerned tone: “May I still kiss your pointy parts?”

She rolled her eyes, but couldn’t hold back a grin. “Breasts. Yes, you may still kiss my pointy… my breasts, silly.” She wasn’t entirely certain if he was deliberately ridiculous, or truly ignorant, but both was likely, and both was endearing. It made it a bit easier for her to lean back, expecting him to start crawling on top of her, and she braced herself for the inevitable transfer of control from her to him.

 _This is Diaval. Diaval. My silly bird. My Diaval. He won’t try to hurt me. I am awake. I still have power. I can allow him this much._

But Diaval didn’t crawl on top of her, despite his very obvious, very prominent need. Instead, he laid next to her, the warmth of his body welcome and comforting at her side, like it was in his raven form. He leaned his head between her breast, jet- black hair spilling over her chest, an errand feather sticking out at an awkward angle and tickling her under her chin. She held back a very undignified giggle and smoothed his hair back before he noticed what his unruly plumage was doing to her and gave him some funny ideas. She wouldn’t put it past him to start a tickling war in the middle of their mating session.

“What are you doing now, silly bird?” she whispered in his hair. Again, his lack of rushing urge to copulate baffled her, compared with her previous, if meagre experience.

“Listening to your heartbeat. It’s so strong. So powerful”, he looked up at her, the bliss clouding his glittering eyes much like it did whenever she caressed him as a bird. “I love it. I could listen the whole night through.”

“Aren’t you going to do a bit more than listening?”

Because the look of him, so completely devoted, so dazed with pleasure, so entirely _hers_ , and with that hardness pressing against her leg, was sending the warm tingles down her belly again. And she thought she was done for the day with that.

“Impatient”, he chided gently, pressing new kisses at her breasts. When he came to a hardening nipple, she choked back a moan, and he cocked an eyebrow, obviously storing the information in his rapidly expanding Practical Guide of Handling Maleficent of the Moors. “We’ll get there.”

“You sound suspiciously unlike how a flustered virgin should”, she observed. “Are you sure you told me everything I need to know?”

“I’m half a virgin now, I guess”, he chuckled. “Or am I not? Silly human construct.”

“I see you managed to avoid my…oh, yes. Do that again.”

“Told you. I observe. I remember.” He ran the tip of his tongue over her nipple. “Humans talk a lot. Soldiers. Laundrymaids. Young lovers. Cheaters. They have no seasons; they mate all year long, wherever they can. Barns, cornfields, taverns with open windows. It’s very educational.”

“You have much more fun on those spying missions than you normally let me know, do you not?”

He chuckled, his breath on her belly now, making her want to spread her legs and drag him there. “I’m an opportunist. I take all I can.”

She paused at that. She was warmed up by his hands and his breath, his kisses that traveled very low again, and the urge to spread her legs for him was becoming intense, her discomfort at the loss of dominance pushed back to the very back of her mind, almost forgotten.

“Then take. Now.”

His face grew flushed at that, and his eyes grew impossibly large under the locks of hair falling over them. His body twitched where it was hard against her leg, but he answered, voice low: “Not yet.”

She didn’t even have the time to protest before he lowered his lips down to her center and took away her power of speech. Again.

And again, she resorted to moaning, writhing and finally screaming, as he put his knowledge from her earlier guidance to good use, proving her that he was, in fact, an apt learner, just as she had expected him to be. 

_I don’t deserve him,_ a thought flashed through her mind. _I don’t deserve this devotion, and once I lose him, and I will, it will be entirely my fault_. 

He interrupted that line of thoughts by sending white lightning through her body and behind her eyes again. 

She didn’t quite lose consciousness, of course such thing would never happen to her, but she was a bit lightheaded with hyperventilation. She closed her eyes, enjoying the aftershocks she was having, and when she opened her eyes, Diaval’s concerned eyes were watching her closely right next to her face.

“Mistress?”

“Mmmm.” He was again in a perfect position to kiss her, but strangely, she was not anxious now. She knew he wouldn’t try anything that she forbade him. “Come here, you suspiciously talented bird, you.”

She angled her leg so he could easily move over her, and he did, slowly, never taking his eyes off hers. Again, his pupils dilated and constricted excitedly, again and again. Her fear of being overpowered flickered in her chest, but not nearly as strong as earlier. She took in Diaval’s adoring eyes, the trembling hand he brought to her face to caress it, and it was all better. 

He reached down to take himself in the hand, and she felt him probing around the right general area of her body. Seeing his uncertainty, she took his hand and gently helped him find what he was looking for.  
“May I?” he asked again, so quietly, breathing fast and shallow. 

“ _Please_.” The word was out before she could stop it. She couldn’t remember when was the last time she pleaded. She didn’t have the time to regret it, though, because the sensation of being slowly, gently entered overwhelmed her. So did the sight of Diaval’s closed eyes, the hissing sound he made and which she now interpreted as a sign of intense arousal, the ragged breath he took as he waited for her to adjust to his size and shape again.

“ ‘s it hurt?” he murmured in her ear, barely moving an inch. His breath tickled her ear. Goodness, it felt nice.  
“No. No, silly. Come on, stop fussing.”

“May I kiss you here?” his breath continued to trace the line of her ear, and she moaned yes, yes, there. 

And he did. He placed loving, small kisses all around her ear, on her temple, in her hair and down her neck. It occurred to her at that point that he’d never kissed anybody before; he had said so earlier, but had he ever been kissed, by anybody? By that little beast, yes, in his bird form; she had seen the child smacking him on the top of his head or on the bridge of his beak, but Maleficent had a different kind of kiss in mind. She buried her face in his hair and kissed him there, taking in his scent, drinking it. He whimpered and exposed his scarred neck to her, and traced his scars with her lips. Every feather and hair on his head stood up.

“You’ll need to move”, she reminded him softly. 

“I know, I know, I just…a little longer.” My, does he like to take his sweet time, she thought. But he did pull gently back, then forth, and sighed shakily. “What a funny way to mate. Like ducks.”

Maleficent almost sprained her neck in an effort to look him in the eyes, too see if he was serious.

“ _What_?”

“Ducks. Their males are a bit like human in this regard. Most of us birds, males I mean, we don’t have this, this…mating tool.”

“A cock.”  
“No, not a cock. A duck”, he said patiently. “Male ducks have that thing, but much bigger than human. It’s longer than their whole body. And it’s spiral in shape.”

“The ‘mating tool’ of a male human, silly. It’s usually called a cock.”

“Oh.” He frowned. “But that doesn’t make any sense. Cocks don’t have…cocks.”

“Diaval…”

“But that explains a thing or two. And there I was listening a certain laundrymaid talking about achin’ to have a cock between her legs, and I was wondering if many human ladies were that attracted to domestic fowl.”

“Oh, you…” she tugged at one black feather, and he yelped, grinning. She tossed her head back and laughed wholeheartedly. “How, oh how did we come from the mating talk to this ridiculousness in a blink of an eye, and why?”

“Well, maybe…because it feels so nice when you laugh, and I’m inside you…”

His voice was very low and raspy, and his heart was picking up speed, she could tell. 

“Getting there, hmm? Perhaps it’s all that silliness about cocks and ducks and laundrymaids?” she teased, brushing his hair away from his eyes.

“Maybe a little. But it’s mostly you.”

Instead of an answer, she gripped his lower back with her both hands and urged him to press harder.

“Ah, mistress…if you keep doing that…”

“I know. Come on, Diaval, dear…I want to see you feeling what I…just... _come on_.”

Finally, he allowed himself to take care of his own needs. Unlike her, he had no trouble achieving the necessary rhythm (though Maleficent was of the opinion that it was merely because he didn’t have to spread his legs and nearly dislocate his hips in the process). The sensation in her insides was almost painful, but not quite; fulfilling, literally and metaphorically; comforting in any case. She buried her face in his neck, his shoulder, and kissed him, licked him, tasted salt there. 

“ _Bite me”_ , she heard him growl; the most animalistic sound she had ever heard from his human form, other than his cawing laughter. Still, he didn’t sound threatening at all. He sounded desperate; his thrusting was now desperate, and so was the grip of his talons on her shoulders. She felt them digging in her skin, but that little bit of pain wasn’t unwelcome; it was exhilarating.

So she obliged, albeit carefully, aware of her sharp fangs. When she dug her teeth in the scarred skin of his neck, trying not to actually draw blood, he went silent as a stone and she let go instantly, afraid that she had hurt him. But the look on his face, his eyes closed and his head tossed back; oh, had it been this exciting for him to see her undone as it was for her to see him like this, to feel him shudder, inside and out, and lose control completely? And just how on Earth could he remain this silent in such a moment? 

_Hold me_ , she heard his whispering in her ear, as he was descending from his ecstatic heights, trembling all over, and she did. She held him tight to her chest, and he held her, too, embracing her shoulders, not her back. Tears burned her eyes, because she knew he had never been held in his man-shape before, and as for her, the last time she allowed somebody to wrap her in their arms, she ended up mutilated and betrayed. She didn’t think she’d ever again feel good to have a pair of arms around her body, but here she was. His weight pressed on her, but she didn’t mind. She wanted to feel him in any way possible, just a little bit longer. 

Because when they separate at last, it will be all over, and she will have to face the consequences of what she had just done to him.

“Are you all right?” he asked hoarsely, anxiously. She nodded yes, wanting to savour the feeling of his body inside hers just a moment longer, but the overbearing creature just had to pull himself slowly out- she gasped at the sudden cold there- and bend over her nether regions to assess the possible damage. She felt a gush of warmth seeping out of her, and he obviously saw it, because his voice took on a slightly panicked tone: “Er, uh…something’s….leaking.”

Despite her rising dread of the inevitable confrontation which awaited, she had to chuckle at him. Her eyes were closed, but she knew exactly the distressed expression he was sporting at the moment. “It is all right, silly bird. It’s your own fluid. It is supposed to happen.”

“Oh.” A pause, and she knew he was just realizing exactly how sticky and sweaty they both were. “Human body never ceases to perplex me.”

She didn’t answer; instead, she flicked two lazy fingers to magic away most of the stickiness away from them both. And while she was at it, she paid extra attention while cleansing her insides from it. What couldn’t be dissipated, she rendered inactive. She didn’t know if it was possible at all for her to conceive with Diaval, given their different hereditary background, but caution was warranted. 

She felt him stretching out his body next to her, close enough to feel his breath tickling her neck. She deliberately kept her eyes closed, bracing herself.

What on Earth had she done?

He was a raven, a creature that mated for life. He was already imprinted on her, she had already taken him away from his old family, made it impossible for him to find a new one, and now, now even if there had been a slightest possibility for him to get back to where he used to belong and to find himself a mate who wasn’t a disturbed, evil, just- short- of- infanticidal entity…she had just made that possibility even less probable. 

She thought of him with another, with a young she-raven, or even with a lovely, kind laundrymaid, and it was unbearable.

But it was beyond ridiculous, to think of it as unbearable. He was only temporary here, with her, just like everybody else. If life had taught her anything, it was the fact that nothing good ever lasted, nothing pure ever remained unblemished, and love- friendly and romantic alike- was an illusion of an inexperienced mind. 

Sure, what she felt for her peculiar companion felt a lot like love. Different than that she’d thought she felt for Stefan, without the initial onslaught of butterflies in her belly and the obsessive thoughts haunting her dreams and waking hours. Rather, it came without her even noticing, slowly, not over the days and weeks, but over the months and years, like ivy growing steadily around her heart, rooting itself firmly without a warning, soundless, unnoticed, until she could no longer tear it away without tearing away pieces of her heart along with it. It was even more dangerous for its inconspicuousness.

But no matter how it seemed to feel, Maleficent knew better. It wasn’t love, because love didn’t exist. It was dependency. A weakness. A byproduct of loneliness. She would be wise not to follow that path.

And Diaval, the poor, naïve creature, couldn’t possess that wisdom. He thought he loved her, certainly. He didn’t know any better. He didn’t know what she knew; he honestly believed that his feelings for her would last. 

Silly bird. If course it wouldn’t. Ravens mated for life, yes, but not out of love. It was out of instinct. It was in their nature. Just like it was in the nature of every living thing to be able to betray, to forget, to leave. Everybody left, sooner or later, and so would Diaval; even if he’d remain with her physically, his heart would grow cold. He wouldn’t even be to blame. It was how it was, and he was still too young, too innocent to have learned that. And may Mother Nature forgive her, it seemed that she would have to be his lesson. 

Because acting upon the foolish aching of heart would bring him nothing but unnecessary pain. It would bring them both unnecessary pain. And it was her responsibility to protect him from it. It was her fault they went this way; she had to set him straight, extinguish any false hope he might be growing in that overly kind heart of his. 

He might hate her for it; he might feel discarded, betrayed. And it would be a good thing. What must be, must be. As quickly as possible. Like pulling an arrow from the wound.

She realized that their legs were intertwined. She didn’t want them to separate. She didn’t want to open her eyes.

 _Stop this. Get your wits together. Chin up, voice low_. 

How was she going to meet his eyes? She knew what she was going to see in them. How was she going to find the strength to see his tears again, if there be any? They were her undoing in the first place.

 _Enough. Enough of this ridiculous sentimentalities. Be short and precise. Open your eyes. Turn to see him. Keep calm_.

She opened her eyes. Her hands were growing cold with dread.

 _You are Maleficent of the Moors. You will not be bested by misplaced affection for some silly bird_.

Only he wasn’t just any…

 _Enough_. 

_Strong_. 

She turned to face him. And she saw exactly what she had feared she would see. A hesitant, expectant smile was on his lips. His warm black eyes were alight with joy. With what he certainly thought to be love. With hope. Bright, like fire. 

She had to snuff it out immediately. It would bring him only pain. Her stomach turned. 

_Strong_.

“Well, that was an interesting way to pass the time.”

 _Well done. Keep going_.

She could feel the beating of his heart, faster and faster. The fire in his eyes flickered, fighting to stay alive. 

_Do it. Deliver the blow. Don’t make him suffer needlessly._

She pulled her legs from his and started getting to her feet. Slowly, because her back was killing her, and there was ice in her belly upon seeing that light in his eyes give out at the sight of her face which didn’t move a muscle, and her knees felt like they were full of cotton, and she couldn’t let him see any of it.

_Deliver it._

“I expect you not to let this enjoyable pastime to get to your head, Diaval. It meant nothing, other than exactly that- an enjoyable pastime. It changes nothing.”

There.

A shiver went down her spine, and she realized she had to send him away for the night. She wouldn’t be able to keep herself together for much longer. 

“Of course, mistress.” His voice was quiet, but calm. As if he knew exactly what she was going to say. As if he had been prepared. Had he guessed? Did he truly know her that well? Did he understand why?

 _Irrelevant_.

Other words left her mouth. That coldest, most logical part of her mind took control of her words, and she listened to herself talking about their coupling serving the additional purpose of him getting more acquainted with human customs. About him possibly needing to use the experience he’d just gained to seduce some young human female for information. It sounded like babbling. But at least it sounded logical. Though at the thought of him with some human hag, something ugly started revolving in her guts.

 _Irrelevant_.

“If that is so, mistress, I suppose that it would be wise if we practiced on regular bases.”

It was difficult, so very difficult to keep a straight face at this. She guessed he either tried to rile her up so they could fight, which would give him the opportunity to blow some steam off, or he was trying to sound unconcerned. Either way, it was funny, how quick his mind was. An opportunistic scavenger at his best- taking what he could, smart, adaptable. Adaptable above everything. Good for him. 

“Hm. I suppose that would be wise.” Because he caught her off-guard with his cheekiness, and she couldn’t think of anything else to say. 

Besides, it did sound like an excitingly good idea.

He obviously didn’t expect that answer, because he paused in the middle of the process of getting dressed, bent over, his trousers below his knees, and looked at her incredulously. Ah, so he was now caught off- guard. Good, good. It felt a bit like their usual bantering. 

“But I expect you not to press the matter.” She proceeded, seeing that she was gaining advantage. “Not once I will tolerate you pestering me with requests of such kind. Do you understand?” 

“I would never dream of it, mistress.”

He let just a little bit of bitterness seep into his voice, just a bare hint, but it was enough. She looked at him, and saw him trying to hide his eyes while clumsily finishing the laces on his trousers, and the profound sense of irreparable loss struck her. She, too, busied her hands with her clothing. Her throat was becoming dry; her body was still tender inside from their coupling, and her hands trembled at the memory of the touch of his skin and hair on her palm. She needed him to go away. Immediately.

“Wouldn’t you? No, I suppose you would not.” _Send him away, now_. “Why are you still here, in my nest, Diaval?”

“You called me here, mistress, and I dare say, you kind of held me back a little.”

 _Smart- arse_. “So I did.” She turned her back to him, now that her ugliness was safely hidden away. He knew how she looked there. She just didn’t want to remind herself of it. Her voice was alarmingly high; her breathing was too quick for her liking. Her eyes were beginning to burn. She was out of time.

“I will have no further need of you until tomorrow. Good night, Diaval.”

She didn’t wait for him to answer. She changed him back into his original shape, and the whoosh of his wings told her that he couldn’t wait to be away from her, too. He needed to lick his wounds as well.

Away from her, and the nest he was sleeping in, right next to hers. Hers, which they sometimes shared, and in which they have just made lo...they just mated. In which she gave him his first time, and now was kicking him out like a stray dog. 

In which the nights sometimes got difficult, and horrendous, but the warble of his rough voice made the darkness stay away. 

She stepped out of her shelter, gripping the rough tree trunk for support. Her wing stumps fluttered on instinct, wanting to steady her with the limbs that were no longer there.

_Don’t. Don’t. No..._

“Oh, Diaval.”

She thought he wouldn’t hear, given that he was swift on making the distance between them, but he did. He made a long turn, hovering on the updraft, and descended to hover a little bit above her. Intelligent black eyes pinned her down.

“It’s getting dark. Don’t be long.”

She turned away and went inside her home, with a gait that she hoped to have looked determined rather than hasty and panicked. She used her magic to close all the branches that made the walls of her home as tightly as possible. And when she was certain that not a fly could get in, she allowed herself to drop down to her knees in the nest that was still warm from their bodies, bury her face in her hands, and weep. 

_Oh, shut up, you foolish woman. What are you crying after? You are not losing anything. You never had anything in the first place. It is all an illusion, a trick that our hearts play on us_. 

She rocked back and forth, choking back her sobs. Through her foggy vision, even in the near darkness of her solitary dwelling, she saw a few soft, small feathers in the straw and leaves of her nest, some brown, some black; some Diaval’s, and some her own, from her stumps.

 _It was a wise thing, reminding him of his place. Next thing you know, he would be expecting you to admit to some kind of attachment to him. Stupid bird. You are surrounded by ridiculous beasts_. 

She laid down in a nest that suddenly appeared much too large for her. She curled herself up on her side, pulling a blanket over her shoulders. The scent of Diaval lingered. Like she sometimes felt the presence of nonexistent wings, the ghost of his touch went over her breasts, her belly, her groins. That touch. Soft lips. Rough hands. Sharp talons. All gentle, ever so gentle and adoring.

_You had a good time. We will give him that much. All in good fun. Very entertaining. He learns quickly just how to touch, clever bird. But it meant nothing. Absolutely nothing at all. You got carried away a little because you hadn’t been touched like that in years, and it was a very nice affair, but it meant nothing._

_Nothing at all_.

oOo

Maleficent was startled awake by a loud pecking sound. 

She bolted up in the nest, her magic already swirling around her fingers, heart racing and teeth bared. Something was persistently attacking the outer walls of her home- _toc, toc, toc,_ without hesitation, as if owning the place. And it was somehow familiar.

Her tired brain tried to rewind the latest events which led her to the point of being roughly woken up in her home, crouching and snarling like an animal, and why on Earth was Diaval so silent? He normally slept like a proverbial bird, stirring at every sound; has he gone deaf?

And why was his nest...empty...?

 _Toc, toc, toc_.

“ _Carr_ ”, an irritated call joined the pecking from the outside. Oh, she knew that call, all right.

As the images started unfolding in her memory, her heart went from alarmed to frantic. Was that all...was she dreaming? And if she was, then why was Diaval outside, demanding to be let in, in the middle of the night? Was she losing her mind?

She hurriedly lifted up her robes and her shaky fingers hastly explored her entrance, finding herself sore there, and much moister than usual. When she pulled her fingers out, the purplish fairy lights of her home illuminated a faint trace of blood, and there was the unmistakable scent of a man’s fluids. 

Not a dream. It truly happened. Diaval and her. 

_You shouldn’t be so glad of that._

“Caw- _carrrr_!” there was a lot of wing flapping outside, and unless she intended to pretend that she had suddenly lost her hearing, there was no point of denying him further. Bracing herself, poising for his likely resentment, she let her magic make entrance for him among the branches. 

He fluttered in, heading straight for his roost. The cold air from the outside made her shiver, and she quickly closed the entrance again. From the corner of her eye, she spied Diaval getting comfortable in his nest, preening his ruffled feathers vehemently. 

Yes, just like owning the place. The audacity of that creature.

Her palms itched to turned him back into a man, to start a fight with him, and yet, she feared it. He acted as if she wasn’t there, expertly using his beak to smoothen the flight feathers on his both wings, rubbing his head over his rump, scratching his head with his foot. Despite herself, she fondly recalled the trouble he used to have while adapting to the relative lack of flexibility of a human body compared to his original one. He almost dislocated his neck once, trying to rub his head against his lower back. And he was so funny, and innocent. Sweet. Obedient. Not like this cheeky troublemaker he’d become.

Well, if he was going to give her the silent treatment, that was fine by her. She didn’t care. Why would she? It was nothing special, their mating. All creatures mated. So what? Just like she had told him- an enjoyable pastime. She wasn’t bothered that he ignored her. Why wouldn’t he? She understood why he would be mad. Because he was a silly bird which still had difficulties discerning fantasy from reality. He’d get over it. She had told him nothing but truth, anyway. What they did changed nothing between them, and it meant nothing. Absolutely nothing. 

She slowly crawled back under her cover, turning her back to him. The outline of her stumps was probably visible, and this time, she made a conscious effort of not trying to hide them away. She didn’t care if he thought her ugly and disfigured. Let him see. It didn’t matter. If her heart was beating so fast and loud that her ears were ringing, it was because the sound of his shuffling around irked her, preventing her from falling asleep. And this burning in her eyes, it’s nothing but a result of her exhaustion and physical pain in her back. If her breathing was a bit ragged, that was because she was so rudely awoken from her deep sleep by that obnoxious raven. And if she was pulling her blanket over her head, it wasn’t because she was hiding her face from her servant; it was because she wanted to fall back in the slumber as soon as possible. To disappear.

“Click.”

 _No_.

“Click click.”

_No and no._

“Clo- cawww.”

_Shut up._

“Carrrrrrrrrrrr.”

 _Ignore him. Or better yet, turn him into a moth_.

“Clo- cawww. Clo- cawwwww. Clo- cawww. Awk- arrrrrr. Awrrrrrrrrrrr.”

She turned to stare at him furiously in the semi-darkness. “Will you be quiet?”

He tilted his head to the side, watching her with the same alarming clarity he did in his human form. He ruffled his feathers and made a trembling motion with his wings. 

“What?”

He made a fluffy ball out of himself, shivering all over. “Awrrrrrr.”

“Oh, please. It’s not that cold.”

He clicked his beak several times in a fast staccato rhythm with his exaggerated shivering. 

“What do you want me to do? Call off the winter? You are a _bird_ , for goodness’ sake.”

Well, she could, technically, use her magic to make their home a bit warmer. But it wasn’t that cold. And that wasn’t what he was going after, she knew.

_Don’t indulge him._

“Awrrrrrrrrr. Click.”

He wasn't asking to be turned into a man, she knew. If he was, he’d be cawing like mad and jumping around her. It would make their communication much easier, but she wasn’t yet ready to see the expression on his face, and apparently, neither was he ready to show it.

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s only a bit nippy.”

His head sank into his feathers, beak still clicking and whole body shaking with ridiculous intensity; the picture of abandonment and misery. His nictitating membrane blinked furiously over his eyes as if trying to get something out of them, and she wondered where the curses had he spent the last few hours. He did look rather...windswept.

_Don’t fall for that._

She budged over to make some space in the nest, mumbling irate curses under her breath, and beckoned him to come. 

_This is the exact opposite of what you should be doing. You are letting him think that you believe in his charade_.

Better that than letting him know that she knows he’s pulling her leg and still letting him have his way.

He fluttered next to her and wasted no time snuggling in her chest, making himself right at home and cooing blissfully. Maleficent rolled her eyes at his miraculous recovery, and perhaps, at her own immesurable sense of relief, like dislodging a huge, cold boukder off her chest.

She had no particular reason to kick him out, after all; he didn’t break a single rule. He didn’t ask to mate with her again, just like she had ordered him not to. He didn’t even ask to be a man again. He only wanted to get some body heat. So what if he pulled off some transparent histrionics to get his way? She had only indulged him so she could get some sleep.

To think better, she could use some warmth too, she thought, while starting to caress his back in a familiar way, comforting to both. It was only her skin and his feathers leaning into one another, sharing a comforting touch; it was only some body heat being shared in a cold night, nothing more, and it meant, of course, nothing.

Nothing at all.


	9. Brushed away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by the novelization "Maleficent", by Elisabeth Rudnick. Precisely, by the part in which Diaval attempts to comfort Maleficent, and she brushes him away.  
> The sequence of the dialogue implemented in the fic is quoted at the beginning of the chapter.

* * *

* * *

* * *

  
_He began to rub his feathered head against her as though comforting her. But Maleficent was not in the mood._

_“Stop!” she ordered._   
_He began to rub harder. With an angry wave of her hand, she transformed him into a man. When he was up on two feet, he looked at Maleficent, his expression worried._   
_“Mistress,” he said, “you’re miserable.”_   
_“I’m perfectly fine,” she replied._   
_“No, you’re miserable,” Diaval repeated._   
_“I’m going to make you miserable if you don’t stop saying that.”_   
_Diaval shook his head. There was no getting through to her with words. But maybe…? He slowly reached out a hand and touched her shoulder, hoping to comfort the upset faerie. It didn’t work. She turned her icy glare on him and shook his hand off. As Maleficent turned and began to walk away, she silently fumed. What right did Diaval have to try to comfort her? Who did he think he was? He was why she was in this mess in the first place._

  
- **from “Maleficent”, by Elisabeth Rudnick**

* * *

* * *

* * *

She had tried. She had failed. 

Maleficent had all but turned to waxen statue since the night she had failed to remove the curse. She told Diaval what happened in a flat, quiet voice, staring fixedly at an unmoving little leaf in their home. 

He stared at her in utter horror. He couldn’t remember how he ended up on his knees, writhing in attempts to choke back the assault of devastating panic and grief. Maleficent, on the other hand, appeared dead, inside and out. Only the fast flutter of her pulse on her neck gave out that she wasn’t calm; she was frozen.

She didn’t reach for him then. And he didn’t reach for her either. For the first time in seventeen years, he _hated_ her. Hated her with passion which was equal to that of his love for her. It was her fault. Her fault that his fledgling was going to become as good as dead. Her and her vindictiveness, her cruelty, her recklessness and her overconfidence. If only she had realized earlier that she couldn’t lift the curse, if only she had listened him for a change…they would have had more time. Perhaps they would have found a way. 

He had stumbled away from her after a while on that horrible, horrible night. On his human legs, clumsier than they have been even when he had first been adjusting to his man- shape, he had shakily staggered away from their home, fell on all fours some fifty feet away, and convulsively emptied his stomach in the grass underneath him. The dawn found him soon, awake, and when Maleficent emerged from the canopy of leaves, she looked like she had aged fifty years in a few hours.

Wordlessly and without explanation, she turned him back into a bird. They didn’t speak that day at all. They moved around like animated corpses.

Maleficent didn’t try to reach out and stroke Diaval’s feathers. He didn’t try to get close to her at all. Only at the nightfall, before Aurora’s arrival, did some life seem to seep back into Maleficent’s eyes.

That night, Diaval steered clear from them both. He didn’t want to be a man again just yet; he knew he wouldn’t be able to conceal his grief and despair. Much like Maleficent once was, he now found himself in a role of an outsider, an intruder hiding in the trees, observing but not making appearance.

Instead, he watched his fledgling gesticulating excitedly to a significantly subdued Maleficent, and he remembered how stunned and happy she looked when she first saw him transform into a man. He remembered the touch of her fingers in his own, of his kiss on her hand. He had opted for such a controlled, gentlemanly act then, because he wasn’t certain that she would be very much thrilled with a grown, spooky man in black who had just transformed from a bird throwing his arms around her in a bear hug and calling her his fledgling, his precious child. 

Just a few days later, she had dispelled all worries about him possibly being too intimidating for her when she threw her arms around him and squeezed so tight that his ribs hurt; his very first hug of his child in his human form.

_‘Oh, I’m so sorry! Did I hurt you?’_ she had asked then, because he couldn’t hide the gleam of tears in his eyes. But the tears were not from her vice- like grip, and Maleficent knew it when she thankfully interfered: ‘ _Don’t be silly, Aurora. He’s just a big, immature nestling which would sell his own tail for a bit of cuddling. So infantile.’_

‘ _I guess I need to hug you often, then’_ , the girl beamed at him. And just when he had thought it was impossible to love her more than he already did. 

‘ _Careful, beastie. He’s already spoiled enough as it is.’_ But both the child and the raven- man grinned at the fairy, and she rolled her eyes, outnumbered.

Now it seemed to have happened decades ago.

And so he spent the first night watching his fledgling and his mistress from the treetops. He listened to Aurora asking Maleficent about her wings, watch her taking Maleficent’s hand in hers, saw indescribable pain in the fairy’s eyes, and Diaval’s gut feeling like he’d swallowed broken glass. Other than that, he felt mostly numb, as in an unrealistic and not particularly vivid dream. He felt like his soul had left his body, and he was watching at the world, himself included, from a distance, thinking ‘ _this is me. This is me, and I am sitting here, and my fledgling is going to die. Nothing special to see. Just my child dying._ ’

The next day, Maleficent headed for the Dark Pond. Diaval didn’t accompany her. 

The day after that, he did. They still hadn’t spoken a word, and he hadn’t been in his human form since Maleficent’s revelation. Following her here was something he did out of habit, still feeling as if his body was pulling his detached soul along without much desire from the latter to reconnect. He sat there on a branch of a gnarled old tree, not trying to get close to his mistress, and she gave no sign of being aware of his presence. They spent hours in utter silence, watching the dark waters simmer and the occasional troll passing them by, but giving them no trouble.

The day after that, something stated to gnaw at his numbness; an itch, like a tiny pin feather pulling subtly at his skin, growing out of it. It was while they were at the Dark Pond again when Diaval felt lightheaded with hunger, and it dawned on him that while he ate very little these previous days, Maleficent ate nothing at all, and the gnawing feeling of unease started to take form of an additional worry. It wasn’t only Aurora who was going to perish, he realized. 

_I am going to lose them both._

The thought was like a brick to the head. It made him stir on his perch, ruffle his feathers, shift in alarm, while his heart stated to race and his stomach to churn. He looked at his mistress- really looked at her, for the first time in days- and saw her haunted eyes and her wasting form anew. 

As much as he was angry at her, furious and mad, he had no time to not love her.

oOo

Diaval knew that the panic and desperation were devouring Maleficent, each day a bit more. They were devouring him, too. 

In his attempts to take care of Maleficent, to at least offer her some resemblance of comfort, Diaval found somewhat of an anchor for himself- a purpose, something to cling to, or he would succumb to despair. When she finally turned him human on Aurora’s demand one night, he uttered the first words exchanged between them in more than a week- _‘thank you, mistress_ ’- and while it was barely a little more than nothing, Maleficent answered with an almost imperceptible nod of her head. After that, they resumed the basic forms of communication- a nod of the head or a caw from him, a ‘ _Good morning_ ’ or a _‘Come along’_ from her, but it was a far cry from their bickering sessions, their long conversations, or their most private moments in their home on the rowan tree.

He was still a human only at nights, while Aurora was with them, so that she could talk to him (a moments he tried to use the best he could; he made a conscious effort to etch the child’s image in his mind, as well as the tome of her voice, her laughter, her words, the feeling of her delicate arms around him). The rest of the time he was a bird.

And he wasn’t complaining. He brought Maleficent berries which she sometimes even accepted, held vigil over her on the rare nights she managed to sleep in case she needed to be calmed in her nightmares, and he accompanied her to the Dark Pond and shared silence with her there. 

oOo

Aurora’s time was short now. So short. Only three days. Three days, and they would never see the girl’s eyes shine with glee, or hear her laughter.

Maleficent slipped away from him. He went to check on Stefan’s castle- on his own accord; Maleficent seemed to have completely lost interest in what was once her burning obsession- and she wasn’t nowhere near home. He headed for the Dark Pond immediately. Finding her there, seeing her all wrapped up in her darkness, all thin bones and sharp angles and eyes that burned brighter as she had grown thinner and thinner, his heart finally gave out and whatever resentment he had been feeling dissipated like dew on summer morning. He landed softly on her bony shoulder and did what he had done numerous times before: he gently rubbed his head against her cheek, the first touch they exchanged in days. 

Normally, she would reach for his head and back, stroking him, caressing him, until they her shoulders would relax and her eyes grew heavy and dimmed. But for the first time in seventeen years, his touch could not bring her comfort. 

“Stop!” she hissed, jerking her shoulder where he sat. 

Something of the now- familiar numbness creeped over him again. His touch was his ultimate weapon; his last chance of stirring her out of her grief- induced stupor. If that fails, he would be left with nothing. Refusing defeat, he rubbed his head against her temple again, only for her to suddenly and irritably turn him into a human. It was so unexpected that he almost stumbled over and knocked into her.  
He looked at her stormy expression and his words betrayed him. They were finally looking eye to eye with him in his human form, alone, and he had no idea what to tell her.

“Mistress, you’re miserable”, the honest truth left his lips. 

“I’m perfectly fine.”

“No, you’re miserable.” Because if she thought she could take him for a simpleton after everything that they have shared in these sixteen years, he could at least argue with her for that.

“I’m going to make you miserable if you don’t stop saying that!” 

Shaking his head, he bit back the words ‘ _my little fledgling is going to be as good as dead in three days because of you; you think you can top that?’_ Instead, he carefully reached out and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, hoping that his human hands could give the comfort that his bird body could not. It always worked before.

Not this time. She shook him off, piercing him with the coldest stare he could remember receiving from her, and turned away, leaving him alone in the Dark Pond, not bothering to give him back his wings.  
He looked after her slowly disappearing form, subtly leaning on her staff, until his vision blurred and he sat on the ground, leaning his back on something he hoped was not a hog troll. His heart was skipping beats, it had been happening often in his human form lately, and he absently wondered if one of those skipped beats would be his last one. If his heart would finally give out, and his mistress would find him dead, tomorrow probably, unless the other scavengers don’t devour him first and scatter his remains all over the Dark Pond. That felt like a pleasant alternative to the icy pain that was creeping in his belly and chest. 

She had brushed him away, and he had lost them both already. He had only been too stupid to have realized that.

oOo

By the time he dragged himself, one foot in front of the other, back to the less dangerous part of the Moors, the numbness had overtaken his soul again. Again, he felt as if floating above his body, observing himself disinterestedly. By habit, he walked on under the moonlit sky, watching the shapes his breath was making in the cold air, until he reached the Wall. It was cold; the thin blanket of new snow creaked under his boots. His body shivered slightly; his fingers ached.

He remembered how he had showed Aurora, long time ago, what fun it was to roll down the snow- covered hills. He had been in his bird body then, and for some reason, the child had found the sight of a raven tumbling sideways down the snowy slope and ending up covered in a heap of new snow (which conveniently fell from a branch despite the lack of any wind, and Diaval strongly suspected that it had something to do with a prank- loving fairy hiding in the woods) incredibly amusing. Her laughter rang all over the valley, and for that laughter, he couldn’t be angry at Maleficent for making a snowbird out of him. After all, she warmed him up that night just fine.

Well, he would have to learn how to live without that laughter now. And without having to watch his step for another practical joke that a certain fairy might come up with. And without being warmed up by her arms at winter nights. Or any other nights.

The thoughts should have brought him to tears. They _would_ have brought him to tears, had he not been so completely and disturbingly dissociated from himself. It was as if he had misplaced his heart somewhere along the way and walked around as an empty shell now. He wondered if that was how Maleficent felt after Stefan mutilated her. He wondered if she was feeling like that now. 

He almost bumped into Maleficent. Of course she was here; this was the spot where Aurora would usually appear on the other side of the Wall, and this was where his legs had taken him as he walked aimlessly, or so he had thought. And his mistress was expecting her. 

He stood a few good feet away from Maleficent this time. He didn’t even look at her in the eye. He stared at the Wall, waiting for Aurora’s voice to announce her arrival. Which was why he was completely unprepared when Maleficent swiftly closed the distance between them, grabbed him by the lapels of his meagre coat and threw him on the ground. He couldn’t even feel fear; he couldn’t feel anything. He was colder than the snow he had fallen into. 

He had expected her to strike him. Or curse him. Or spit him. He didn’t expect her to grab him by his groins, straddling him, and bend over him as if she was either going to devour him, or kiss him. Her eyes burned green; their breaths came together, puffs of wispy white clouds in the chill of the night. 

When Diaval didn’t move at all, she rubbed her hand over his groin and ran her hand through his hair. Her face was gaunt and strained, and there was desperation simmering behind the poisonous green in her irises. Finally, he managed to move his hands, but only to grip both of her upper arms and gently but firmly prevent her from grasping at him any further. Not that she couldn’t blow him away like a dandelion if she wanted to. “Mistress, Aurora is going to be here any- “

“Then stop wasting our time”, she snarled. Her eyes burned brighter.  
“All of the Moorfolk can see us, and you said hundreds of times that you- “

“Most are sleeping, and I don’t care now”, she easily pulled one arm free- despite her apparent fragility, she was at least ten times stronger than him; a mental image of being turned into an ant and then squished dead with one taloned finger crossed Diaval’s mind- and her hand went between his legs again. 

“Mistress”, he struggled as he gripped her narrow shoulders now, and did his best to stop her from moving her hand down his trousers. “Mistress, no. NO!” 

His voice was harsher than any he had ever used on her, or ever thought that he would. But it worked instantly. She pulled back, still crouched on top of him, and cocked her head like a confused bird. He looked her straight in the eye, and the look of confusion, loss and anger there, and fear- was that actual _fear_?- almost had him let her do whatever she wanted with him. But he knew it wouldn’t do any good to any of them on the long run.

“I’m sorry”, he whispered, sounding much more devastated than he wanted to. But he couldn’t pretend. He was devastated. “I’m sorry, mistress. I can’t. I just can’t. Not tonight.” And he wasn’t lying. His body was unresponsive, and he guessed he wouldn’t be able to respond even if he wasn’t freezing his posterior on the frost- covered, hard forest floor. 

The vulnerable look in her eyes gave way to the familiar angry gleam. She stood up above him and growled through gritted teeth, staring him down viciously: “Well, what use are you to me then, anyway?”

“Chronologically or in the order of relevance?” he snapped back from his supine position. A root was digging into his side, but he made no effort to move. 

“Is this some sort of petty retribution for sending you away earlier?” she continued snarling.

“As much as I wish I was that vindictive, no, it’s not. I didn’t even think of that.”

She was shooting venomous daggers from her eyes at him. “You pout when I don’t touch you- you pout when I do- what do you want from me, you ungrateful, wretched vermin?”

_“I want that bloody curse to disappear!”_

He had never yelled at her before, never. Her face was a pale leather mask, but her eyes were burning; a storm was brewing there, terrible and destructive. But he didn’t fear her. There was nothing left for him to lose. “I’m sorry mistress, but I just...can’t. Not even for your sake. Not when Aurora is...” he swallowed hard. It was becoming difficult to speak. “I would do anything you need. That will never change. But this isn't what you truly need now. And neither do I.”

She backed away from him, slowly. Her lips were pressed firmly together; her breathing was ragged. She summoned her staff and gripped it with both hands. The look in her eyes was still like an oncoming storm, but rather than unleashing it on him, she turned away, leaned against a large tree and slid down its rough bark, crumbling among its large roots and resting her head against it. 

Diaval realized that he didn’t particularly care to get to his feet. What was the purpose? He might as well continue to lay there until the roots grow him over. 

“I hated you”, he heard his mistress whispering. At first he thought the words were meant for Aurora, but the girl had yet to come, and he realized that the words were for him. “These past weeks. For making me get to know her. For making me love her. It was you who started all that.”

Optioning between _‘forgive me, but I hardly twisted your hand’, ‘since when can anybody make you do anything’,_ and _‘of course it’s all my fault. You cursing an infant has nothing to do with it’,_ he finally said only: “It’s all right. I hated you too.”

She gave him a morosely amused, sideways glance. “It took you long enough to cime to your senses.”

“Don’t celebrate just yet. It was a temporary thing, I’m afraid.”

“Then you are not nearly as smart as you pride yourself to be. You can still run to Stefan and betray me. Tell him all my weaknesses. Tell him about Aurora, that- ”

“I’m sorry; was that supposed to be…what? Funny? Witty? Guilt- inducing? It’s none of that”, he snapped, rubbing his temples. His head ached from hunger. “And what about you? Am I still your harbinger of doom, then? It would be such a cliché.”

Instead of answering, she turned her eyes away and slowly extended her hand, palm open. 

Diaval observed it for a moment. The blissful numbness, its protective veil already thinned, threatened to leave him altogether. The feeling of having his insides filled with shards of broken glass started to tear him apart again.

He rolled on his side, than on all fours. There was no point in getting to his feet; they were so close, his legs felt as if they were made of sand, and his dignity was, at the moment, very low on his list of priorities. On his hands and knees, he dragged himself next to her, made the supreme effort of pulling himself up into a seated position against the same tree as Maleficent, and carefully took her icy cold palm into his own equally cold, shaky one. 

He had never held hands with anybody. Despite all of the secret touches they have shared over the years, they have never kissed, and never held hands.

He wondered if she wanted to recreate the sensation she had when Aurora took her hand into her own, and will be disappointed now, when he fails to rise up to the standard. He waited for her to brush him away again, to pull back, and he sat there, strung up like a coil of steel, his hand in hers, expecting rejection.

But none came. Her thin fingers interlaced with his own. Tremors were running down her entire frame, down to her fingertips, and Diaval’s hand gripped her own just a little bit tighter. Neither of them looked at the other one; it wasn’t necessary. Their rapid heartbeats met at their wrists. It was cold, so cold; their hearts were filled with equal dread, equal despair, ground was slipping underneath them both, and the only thing that was warm and secure and tethered them to the ground was the feeling of their clumsy hands desperately clinging to one another.

“I am going to tell her about the curse tonight”, Maleficent barely moved her lips when she spoke.

Diaval answered only by clenching her hand tighter. She responded in the equal manner.

They didn’t speak, didn’t move anymore, before Aurora’s voice came calling from the other side of the Wall.  



	10. Fading

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Probably his dying breath, and his stupid mind had to spend it hallucinating.  
> Also, that prince- boy knows his way around skittish creatures.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the novelization of the first movie, Diaval the dragon saves Aurora who falls from the castle, in the exact manner Maleficent the phoenix did it in the second. Unfortunately, that part of the novelization didn't make it to the movie, but on the other hand, the movie doesn't contradict it either. So...

With the speed he was picking up, hurling himself towards the ground, Diaval was almost certain that this was not only his first flight as a dragon, but his last one as well. There was no way he would be able to stop in time before his huge mass would crash in the ground in what was bound to be a bone- shattering impact. 

That was registered by his brain merely as an afterthought, though, and not as his prime concern. His prime concern was to catch Aurora’s falling form before she made her own crash to the ground. He had done a considerable damage to the masonry around him during his rage- fueled clash with the king’s guard, and when Aurora ran towards the balcony where she had last glimpsed Maleficent fighting Stefan, the bloody thing started crumbling apart, taking Aurora down. 

Perhaps Maleficent would be fast enough to catch her. Certainly, she would be strong enough. But he couldn’t leave it to chance, of course. Ignoring Maleficent’s silent form (silent _winged_ form, his heart sang with joy, even though the terror and the pain) that rose from the ground and was rapidly closing distance between herself and Aurora, he charged down. 

And he had made a good call, he realized. His wings were much bigger, he was much faster, and Maleficent was still too far to catch the girl when his enormous talons clasped around her now- so- tiny, screaming form, his leathery wings spread wide to break the fall, but not before his tail furrowed into the ground, making his already doomed descent even less coordinated. 

_If I live, she’s never let me hear the end of it_ , he thought while clutching Aurora close to his belly, wrapping one of his wings over her, making a barrel- roll attempt to flip himself around so he wouldn’t crush her in impact, and his last coherent thought was ‘ _what is that fool of a boy still doing here?_ ’ before his crash against the ground was heard, rather than felt, as a disturbing cracking sound that reminded him of a green branch being snapped in two. Then the searing pain came, and then the blackness, and then nothing.

oOo

He must have been out for a very short time, moments only, because when he opened his right eye (the other one felt as if it was full of dirt, which probably had something to do with the fact that the left half of his freakishly large face was buried in the ground) he saw smoke rising from the castle, heard the soldiers yelling (‘ _pull back_ ’ seemed to be the only thing left in their vocabulary at the moment), and the panic surged through him when he couldn’t feel Aurora’s body clutched against him, under his wing. 

He stirred, tried to rise, to look around, but it proved to be exceedingly difficult due to the debilitating, sharp pain in his left wing and his head. The fact that his vision seemed to be doubling and blurring wasn’t helping. But he had to find her, she had to be alive, just _had to._ If he had just killed his hatchling, he would get back to that tower and fly himself into the ground again, but headfirst this time. He tried to call for her, but all that his current form could make was an anguished roar.

“Lie still!” Aurora’s voice came from his blind spot to the left. On his yet unfamiliar dragonscale skin, much less sensitive than that of any form he had ever taken, he felt a very familiar touch, that of his heart’s child, and his huge chest let out an enormously relieved sigh. Her tiny hands caressed his long neck, trying in vain to hold him back in place. “Diaval, don’t move! Your wing- Phillip, help me hold him!” 

“ _Hold_ him?” the boy’s voice was shaken and incredulous, but he didn’t back away. His auburn hair came into Diaval’s blurry field of vision on his right, and if Diaval was in a clearer state of mind, he would have been impressed by the boy’s courage, because the dragon- bird felt the most unexpected touch in quite a long time: a trembling hand of an unfamiliar human caressing his long neck in long, soft, determined strokes. 

“It’s all right”, said the soft voice of the young prince close to Diaval’s ear. “Shhhhh. Easy now. Everything is going to be fine. Shhhh, shhhh. Easy. Easy. It’s all right.” 

Diaval had never felt a human hand on himself, with the notable exception of Aurora, and he had only ever seen human hands bringing nothing but death and destruction to his kind, whatever he might consider his kind to be- ravens, birds, animals, Moorlanders, Fair Folk. But this young fellow was either a very good deceiver, or was truly an uncommon member of his species, because Diaval felt no roughness in that touch, and no malice in that soft, reassuring voice. It felt and sounded as if the boy had spent his whole life bringing consolation to anxious, scared creatures- protection, even. 

In the upcoming weeks and months, Diaval will come to realization that Phillip indeed had spent a considerable amount of time around skittish creatures, namely horses, which he adored, and in this desperate moment, he automatically approached a dragon as he would an injured horse. But right now, Diaval’s foggy mind was set on two things: being aware of Aurora’s location at his left, and trying to decipher Maleficent’s whereabouts. So he barely had time to relabel the boy’s ministrations from ‘ _human: probably dangerous’_ to ‘ _human: possibly not a current threat_ ’, before a familiar bolt of green magical force illuminated the darkness around them and effectively terminated Phillip’s attempts at dragon taming by sending the boy flying ten feet away from Diaval. The surge of magic was accompanied by a familiar voice, roaring with unfamiliar hoarseness: “ _Get away from him! Don’t you dare laying a hand on him!”_ , followed immediately by Aurora’s desperate cry: “ _Godmother_! He was _helping_!”

Ah. There she was. Good. Good. Now he could close his eyes for just a little while.

But before he did, he took notice of a magnificent winged form of his mistress, appearing from the darkness and the smoke and the mist like a goddess of everything he had ever believed in. She landed next to him, but the darkness was rushing at the edges of his vision and the only thing he could make out clearly were her ferocious green eyes, darting from Aurora who rushed to her side, to his own, probably pitiful, broken body.

 _I am ashamed_ , a thought surfaced in his mind, while Aurora talked anxiously. “Godmother, oh, are you all right, help him, you can help him, can’t you, his wing, look at his wing, and his head, look here where he hit the ground, oh you shouldn’t have struck Phillip, he did nothing wrong, you need to help him too, are you all right, is the king dead, am I a horrible person if I hope he’s dead, oh poor Diaval, should we move him when he’s like this, can you make him a bird, but what if he gets worse then, where’s Phillip, Godmother can you help them, what can I do, oh, what can I do?”

His sense of shame intensified as Maleficent, in all her terrifying, unearthly majesty kneeled down to him, close to his smoke- breathing, dagger- toothed snout, and a stricken expression on her face became obvious even to his rapidly failing eyesight. He must have been a sorry sight indeed. He didn’t want her to see him like this. He didn’t want Aurora to see him like this, either. He wished to finally be engulfed by darkness, and if he was damaged beyond repair, cease to exist. Which was likely in store for him anyway. His eyesight was all but gone, his hearing was of questionable reliability, and the only thing he was left with was the touch of cool air on his wounds. He was fading. 

“My dear bird”, he heard Maleficent’s voice. He could no longer see her. But the tone of her voice seemed to be similar to the one she had before breaking Aurora’s curse; cracking, trembling, anguished. Which probably meant only that his ears weren’t working right, either. “My dear, brave bird. My fearless dragon.” Again, it seemed as if her voice was hitching, which of course couldn’t be true. Not for him.

He felt her hands on his large temple; a touch he would know anywhere, and a wave of calmness washed over him. He felt her forehead leaning on his feathered face; felt something incredibly similar to a kiss there, and it sent a familiar rush of goosebumps down his hardened skin. His feathers bristled and quivered happily; at least, those he could still feel. He couldn’t feel much below his shoulder blades. What he did feel was the amazement on how many curious, outstanding things happened that night. 

A touch of a few drops of warm rain falling on his cheek. A scent of dusty feathers, definitely in dire need of preening. And a whisper: “My dear friend. My love. My love.”

Oh, wonderful. Probably his dying breath, and his stupid mind had to spend it hallucinating.

“Sleep.”

He did.


	11. Preposterous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A short drabble about Maleficent absolutely not needing the comfort of Diaval's touch, now that her wings are back.

Maleficent had to learn the hard way that, as powerful as she was, she still had limits. 

Those limits were tested quite painfully now.  
On top of having just had a long, exhausting battle with Stefan and his men and their iron, of having her wings reunited with the rest of her body and having them immediately overstrained to the point where her back felt like being covered in molten lava, she also had to use her magic to move a dragon the weight of a small stone building- move him with gentleness and precision- to align the jutting fragments of broken bones of his vast left wing and make them knit together as fast as possible.

She had to carefully check that colossal body for more injuries, and she found broken ribs, broken tail backbone, cracked skull, bruised windpipe and numerous puncture wounds and lacerations.   
She didn’t have much experience with healing beings that were not plants. She did have to heal Diaval before, but never the injuries of this extent, never a body this big, and never had she been this exhausted and concerned about being attacked while healing him. Changing him into a smaller form while the wounds were open and bleeding was out of the question; she feared that it might aggravate his condition. She wasn’t certain that it would, but she wasn’t about to take any chance. 

So she put him to sleep and worked on his dragon form, quickly- first the wing, which was bleeding profusely and soaking the ground in thick, dark blood; then the head injury- it felt ominous, it made what she could feel of his lifeline flicker with dangerous feebleness, and when she forced her magic to focus deeper, she realized that she most likely felt bleeding inside his skull. With no actual knowledge or skill on such injuries, she improvised, hoping that she actually managed to magic what she intended- stopping the bleeding, healing the wound inside, rather than fusing his brain matter with the bone and tissue surrounding it. Her confidence surged when she felt his lifeline tethering within him with renewed firmness, and she focused on his backbone next. From what her magic could tell her, there were no additional injuries underneath, but she knew enough about back injuries to be wary of them. She healed the broken vertebras with as much precision as she could summon. By that point she was exhausted beyond measure, and when she tried to fix his huge ribcage, she knew she had done a sloppy work. He will hurt a lot.

Enough, she decided. None of the remaining injures felt immediately life-threatening, and she leaned on his massive bulk and slid down to the ground. The rest she’ll heal later, when her strength is replenished. She closed her eyes, taking comfort in the reverberations of his slow, steady heartbeat. 

Trying to heal her own wounds, mostly her agonized flight muscles, worked much slower than usual. Normally she would heal within minutes, without any conscious effort; now, she realized, it would take her hours. Hours in which she had to stay alert and ready, should the soldiers decide to attack again. She didn’t trust the white flag their commander came out with one bit. And she didn’t like the fact that Aurora was talking to the man right now. She also didn’t like that the useless prince- boy (Peter? Paul? Preston?), who unlike Diaval sadly _didn’t_ crack his skull, was standing right next to Aurora, and every now and then she would give him a hopeful, pleading look which clearly said ‘ _help me, I’m not good at this_ ’ louder than any words might. Even if the truce was evidently being formed, there was the danger of Aurora being manipulated, or attacked. There was the danger of Diaval and herself being attacked, by renegade soldiers if nothing else; they did manage to kill a few of their comrades, and Maleficent didn’t believe for a second that it will be easily brushed aside.

Her hand searched for Diaval’s feathers, and there they were; long, as soft and sleek as in any of his forms, along the line of his massive neck. She stroked them, felt the his slow pulse underneath, and it made her own pulse slow down significantly. As always. 

She remembered she had her own feathers back, that she no longer needed his touch to comfort herself. That she could let go of him. That she should check her wings, enjoy them, preen them. 

Her hand moved from his back and traced the edge of her right wing. It felt as if touching a foreign body. She felt as if having fallen in a dream- not ugly, but not particularly exhilarating either. It just... _was_. It was nothing alike that initial moment when they had merged back with her body, and she felt that exhilarating, overwhelming surge of power, when the blood in her ears rushed in rhythm with the beats of her wings and she rose in the air once again. 

Now, her strength on its last legs, her magic exhausted, her body sore, it was as if she had never lost them at all. As if she hadn’t spent seventeen years yearning about this exact moment, yet never believing it would happen. As if all her wildest dreams hadn’t just come true. She ran her nails through her dusty, broken flight feathers, and thought how she should preen them. She should want to preen them. She should be overjoyed and ecstatic to have the opportunity to finally preen them again, to touch them and caress them and wrap herself in their protective embrace. She should.

Instead, she felt bone weary at the thought. It would be nice to preen them. It would. It was amazing that she could, again, if she wanted to. But it just didn’t feel...calming enough, at this moment.

She let her sore wings droop low. Her hand left her own feathers and slowly snaked back into Diaval’s black plumage. Just as she had done every day for the past seventeen years, she begun to caress him again, leaning back into his solid bulk. 

Now that _did_ feel...comforting.

_It’s only because the silly overgrown bird is injured. I need him to be in good condition to be my..._

Eh. Now that hardly mattered anymore, did it? She no longer needed him to be her wings. She had her own wings back.

 _I don’t need him anymore_.

Her hand dug deeper into his thick feathers. Scratching a dragon was much more challenging than scratching a bird. 

_I don’t need him anymore_. 

Even in his magic- induced sleep, he gave out a content purr when her sharp nails grazed his skin. It reverberated through his chest and into her own. For some completely unrelated reason, her heart jolted.

 _I don’t need him anymore. And he will know that_.

Her hand went through his feathers and behind his jaw line. His skin was very warm there, almost hot to touch. 

_And he will know that. Let go of him, before he lets go of you._

It was only because she was so tired, that she allowed her head to lean on him, on his long neck, the second time in one night. It was only because she was so tired, that his touch still offered immeasurably more peace than that of her own precious wings.

 _Let go of him_. 

It was only because she was so tired that she decided to postpone his transformation back into a bird, or a man, even if the bleeding had stopped, and all of his broken bones were set right. It was only because she was too tired to move a muscle, that she let her hand rest buried in his long feathery mane, her temple against his scaly throat.

 _Let go of him_.

She needed rest, yes. Once she is rested enough, she will be strong enough to see him leave, if he so chooses, and her own wings will be all she will ever need to comfort her. It had been that way before.   
It was preposterous to think she would still need his touch, now that she had her own feathers back.

So preposterous.


	12. Extraordinary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phillip learns about many extraordinary things; petting a real, living dragon being only one of them..

It was a long night.

King Stefan was dead, but the chaos he had left in his wake was far from over. Phillip wondered, for the thousandth time that night, if he was walking through a very peculiar nightmare, or did he merely lose his mind.

“Your highness, I insist!” Lord Ortolan’s voice traveled the safe distance from the castle’s gate to where Aurora was standing at the fairy’s- Maleficent’s- side, next to the dragon’s leathery wing. “As a rightful heir to the crown, your place is inside this castle, in your quarters!”

“Not tonight!” Aurora yelled back. “Not before all who are injured are taken care of!”

“Your highness, you do remember- you have personally seen all of the injured to be taken to the infirmary!

“Not them!”

Phillip watched the exchange in utter awe. The girl, stronger and braver than she was beautiful, if such thing existed, stood defiantly, chin up, and pointed at her extraordinary companions. The dragon was sound asleep, puffs of smoke occasionally rising from his nostrils. The fairy, looking every bit evil as Phillip’s mother had ever pictured fairy folk to be, was clutching to his feathered neck and glaring at the old counselor as if she seriously contemplated evaporating him on the spot. Strangely, despite her obvious wickedness, Phillip somehow couldn’t blame her. The old man wasn’t sitting right with him either.

Thankfully, the dark-skinned castellan of the royal army – John- was much more amicable, despite the losses his men have suffered. He gave Phillip a knowing look, and the young prince unconsciously rubbed his shoulder where he had hit the ground hard when the fairy had blasted him away from her dragon. Hoping he wouldn’t find himself on the receiving end of her wrath, Phillip made a careful step towards the trio.

“Your high...”

“We have been through this.” Aurora cut him off at once.

He had to smile. They have been through that, true, several times during that night, while trying to organize the firefighting, the help for all the wounded, the evacuation of the dangerously damaged part of the castle, and finally the technicalities in establishing a truce between two warring parties. The commander John, wounded himself- a rather nasty slash to his face, which was bound to leave ugly scarring and was making the man almost unable to speak at the moment- had ensured Aurora that his men were willing to pledge loyalty to Aurora and to cease all hostile actions towards Maleficent, as long as she would give them their word that there would be no more destruction on her part. Phillip had somehow found himself to be a mediator in all this, with both Aurora and commander John looking at him with desperation of people who had found themselves treading on very thin ice, having no idea of how on Earth did they end up there all of the sudden. And through all that, Aurora had pointed out to Phillip, repeatedly, that she was most certainly not a ‘highness’, or a ‘majesty’. Just Aurora.

“Aurora”, he corrected himself. “Maleficent”, he nodded to the horned, winged creature who looked exactly like something his governess would frighten him with in her stories. And yet, Aurora stood beside her- and the dragon - with no fear, only admiration and care in her eyes. “Both parties had agreed to the truce. That means there will be no more fighting- “

“So he says”, Maleficent cut him off, jerking her head irritably at the general direction of the castellan. The look in her glowing eyes that she gave him reminded Phillip of the look his mother had given him once when he had gotten suddenly ill and threw up at the banquet table.

“And I urge you to take him for his word, as he is willing to take you for yours”, Phillip said softly. “You are injured yourself, and princess Aurora needs to rest. Her maids are anxious to help her accommodate. However, one thing...”

“My godmother is not going there with all that iron inside”, Aurora shook her golden head. The sun was rising; the pinkish glow looked like a halo around her head. “And I am not comfortable there just yet. I am staying here, with them, until Diaval can be safely returned to his true form and returned to the Moors.”

Phillip cast a confused look at the sleeping dragon. Commander John shifted uncomfortably and glanced at Phillip, then at the dragon. The prince had a feeling that what he was going to say wasn’t going to make maleficent like him any more.

“I don’t know about his true form”, he started carefully, “but I agree, and commander John strongly suggests, that the dragon must go.”

Maleficent bared her teeth at him. Her magic glowed green at her fingertips. Aurora quickly positioned herself between the fairy and Phillip, frowning.

“Why?”

“Because he’s a _dragon_ ”, Phillip explained patiently, doing his best to keep the exasperation out of his voice. “A fire-breathing _dragon_.”

Aurora turned to glance at the said creature. His tail was twitching in his sleep, the tuft of feathers on its tip rising dusty clouds, and he let out a high-pitched sound not unlike that of a jackdaw’s chirrup. “Oh, no. He's just a raven. He is only a dragon for this...occasion.” She nervously rubbed her hands together.

She had spoken with such conviction that Phillip blinked several times to make sure that the creature in question, big as a house, was not merely a byproduct of his banged-up head. When he made sure that the only thing it had in common with any bird he had ever seen were black feathers along his head, neck and tail, Phillip wondered if the girl was under the fairy’s spell of some sorts, or if her unique vision of the world was entirely of her own making.

Not wanting to upset her, though, he proceeded gently: “Very well. A raven, then. Who had just demolished the castle, killed two men and injured at least fifteen of them. You have seen their burns- “

“He was defending my godmother!” Aurora rose her voice, and Phillip braced himself for the worst. For some reason, he would rather be roasted alive by that dragon, or cursed by that fairy, than to face this girl’s anger. “He was defending _me_!”

“The soldiers- “

“He could have done so much worse”, Aurora stepped forward, her eyes scorching. “But he was holding back! I saw that, I was there- he never aimed to kill anyone!” her small hands were clutched into fists.

Maleficent said nothing, but she rose from the ground where she had been leaning against the colossal beast, her wings slowly spreading wide, eyes burning toxic green, and it was enough for Lord Ortolan to make a swift retreat into the castle, and for the castellan and his men to grip the pommels on their swords.

“No!” Phillip yelled at the soldiers, hastily positioning himself on the line of fire between Maleficent and the soldiers. Within a blink of an eye, Aurora was right next to him, causing an alarmed hiss to escape the fairy’s throat.

“No!” Aurora echoed. “Enough of this! The only person who wanted war was my father, and he is gone! Commander John, you said it yourself- none of you wanted any of this! But you have obeyed him still, because you are good soldiers, loyal to your king! Well, the king is dead, and…” she paused to gather her wits, and Phillip gave her a small nod of encouragement. She wasn’t used to this, she had just gone through her personal hell and back, but she held her ground, and he wasn’t going to interfere unless absolutely needed. “…and it so appears that I am his only heir. So, if you wish to remain at your position in the royal guard, you are welcome to. Those who wish to leave can do so without any repercussions…”, at this point, Phillip whispered into her ear, and she quickly added: “…and you will receive a fair, uh…severance allowance…from the royal treasury.”

She glanced at Phillip, and gave him the tiniest and the most radiant smile of gratefulness Phillip had ever seen. Suddenly his belly felt like he had just had a shot of spirit from Percival’s favorite inn. The chill of the dawn all but vanished, giving in to the heat which rose from his belly to his cheeks.

“But whichever you choose”, Aurora continued, “my first- or last, depending on your choice- order for you is this: the battle is over! Sheath your swords!”

Aurora turned to look pointedly at the fairy, and after a moment of hesitation, the winged woman folded her wings and slowly lowered herself back at the sleeping dragon’s side. Still, she gave Aurora the look which said ‘we are going to talk about this’, if Phillip was any judge, but Aurora seemed completely unconcerned. The soldiers, too, seemed to settle down, whispering among themselves and with their castellan.

Phillip turned to Aurora and whispered: “Please, listen to me. For the dragon’s sake- and everybody else’s- he cannot stay here. The soldiers will be frightful and distrustful as long as he is around, as docile as he seems to be now- “

“He _is_ docile”, Aurora whispered, fervor in her voice. “He’s the kindest, gentlest creature there had ever been! I’ve known him my whole life- he’d never hurt a fly!” she frowned at her own words and corrected herself: “Well, he _would_ hurt a fly, a little, maybe. He’d eat it. And earthworms. And mice. Grasshoppers, absolutely. Beetles, too. All kinds of insects, in short. And anything small and furry. And…” she rubbed her palms nervously again. “But you get my meaning. He’s not a mindless beast that they all think him to be. And they are both exhausted, and he is seriously hurt. Hurt because he was saving me.” her eyes welled up, and Phillip felt a surge of panic. Oh no, no, no- better give him a dragon, than... “You saw that! You were there!”

“I did”, he admitted. “Some of the soldiers saw it, too. But they also saw him wreaking havoc in the castle, killing the two of them- “

“The falling pillar killed them! It’s not his fault he was so big at the time, and the castle is all...crumbly!”

Phillip took a very deep breath. “Yes, well...you have to understand how the soldiers may not quite share your perspective.”

“If...if we are going to have a truce, then _all_ the injured need to be taken care of! He can’t travel to the Moors yet. My godmother can’t enter the castle yet. All I’m asking is some time for them to heal without being bothered by anyone. And during that time, I’m not going anywhere away from them.”

"Your people are confused, scared- they need you.” Phillip heard the desperation in his own voice and hated it. But he was becoming truly desperate. He had a nasty feeling that his presence- or rather, his _royal_ and definitely _male_ presence- was the only thing that kept the soldiers from either regrouping and attacking, now that the dragon and the fairy were obviously not quite up to another battle, or alternatively, deciding that they hadn’t been paid enough for this and hightailing out of the castle and likely from Perceforest altogether. There had been no lost love between the king and his men, that much Phillip had gathered, and with him dead, without the fear from him, or the trust in their new sovereign, to keep them in check...there was no telling what they might decide to do. And when the inhabitants of the Perceforest hear that they had lost their king, and their army, and that they were no longer protected from the fair Folk, or anything else...when the robbers decide to try their luck on the unprotected castle and its crew- or the lone, unguarded princess...or the wounded, helpless dragon and his exhausted fairy mistress whom Aurora loved so much...

He really, really wanted the soldiers to accept Aurora as their ruler. But for that, they had to trust her first. And it was difficult to establish that trust if she was so openly sided with their recent enemy.

“They need their princess, Aurora”, he tried. “They need to trust you. They need to accept your leadership. If they are to obey to you, they need to either fear you or respect you- and, forgive me for being blunt, but I cannot say that it is fear that you inspire. No offence.”

“None taken”, Aurora smiled shakily, and the fairy behind her pierced him with a look which had ‘ _but I do, little princeling’_ written all over her sharp, pale features. Her wings jerked irritably. “But godmother and Diaval...they are my people, too. More than anybody else in this world.”

She solidified her point by walking a few steps back and standing at Maleficent’s side. The girl’s face was dirty with soot, tears having drawn clear tracks on her cheeks; her dress was in tatters; she was barefoot and frightened and yet so, oh so stubborn and unbreakable, with her chin proudly held high and her back straight as a rod; just as stubborn and unbreakable as his own mother, only Aurora was...well, kind.

“We might take offense at that!” something small and bright and pinkish flew past Phillip’s nose, and he flinched back before recognizing one of the little pixies which were so insistent on him kissing Aurora earlier that evening. It seemed to have happened a year earlier, when only a few hours have passed. Maleficent rose a hand as if about to swat the creature away, but Aurora stopped her. “Auntie Knotgrass, we will have to talk. But later”, she said seriously.

“You’ll be happy to know that we have talked to the courtiers and the soldiers”, another one, with a head full of tiny blonde curls, fluttered about Aurora’s head, “You would be surprised how willing they are to trust someone whose magic is _pretty_ and _benevolent_ and _not a tiniest bit evil_.” She cast a very deliberate look at Maleficent, and Phillip had to admit that the pixie was either very reckless, or incredibly brave. But the horned fairy didn’t respond. In fact, compared to what Phillip had seen earlier, she was almost unsettlingly quiet and still. Only her eyes burned. Phillip hoped it wasn't a mere calm before a new storm.

“They are terrified of that beast”, the third pixie continued, the blue one.

“And they don’t like the dragon either”, Knotgrass added.

“I was _talking_ about...”

“Aunties!” Aurora snapped angrily at them all, while Maleficent ignored the insult altogether. If anything, Phillip thought to have seen a tiny, self- satisfied smile at the corner of her blood red mouth. “Maleficent and Diaval saved my life! I will not have you insulting any of them!”

“Your life wouldn’t be in the need of saving if she hadn’t cursed you first”, Knotgrass said with equal anger. Noticing that the smile had suddenly evaporated from Maleficent’s face, Phillip decided to pull the conversation back on track, before another war ensues.

“Ladies”, he said, as calmingly as he could, praying that he won’t get caught in the magical crossfire for his efforts. “Let’s not forget our current pressing issue. The dragon.”

“ _Diaval_ ”, Aurora said. “His name is Diaval. He has a name. He's a person. He’s not an issue. Everybody else seems to make an issue out of him, but he’s not. He’s a good soul, kind soul- and he’s a raven!”

“A raven?” the blue pixie seemed to have come to a realization. “Is that...is that Maleficent’s old bird? Transformed into a dragon?”

“Is that the one who followed you around when you were little?” the blonde one added. “ _That_ ugly old bird?”

At that, the dragon- whom Phillip was now, despite what his eyes were telling him, resignedly accepting to be a raven, since everybody else was obviously seeing something that he did not- suddenly stirred from his sleep, and one huge, golden eye opened wide, pinning the blonde pixie unmistakably with an alarmingly intelligent stare.

The small movement, along with a deep rumble from his huge chest, had all three pixies bouncing back and squealing in fear, along with Phillip, who yelped and jumped back, startled, tripped over his own boot, and fell neatly on his bottom like an overbalancing toddler. His heart was pounding in his ears, but unfortunately not loud enough to cover the clinking sounds of the soldiers going for their weapons again.

“Calm down!” Aurora shouted. “Calm down, everybody! Sheath your swords! He’s- oh, he’s all right; you’re all right, Diaval, are you not?” and without hesitation, she threw herself on the dragon’s scaly snout, wrapping her arms around one huge horn. All of the sudden, she dropped all pretenses, and like a dam overflowing at last, she let out a choked sob and stated to weep into his feathered temple.

The dragon, for his part, closed his eye once again, moved his head only so that Aurora could hold him better, let out a purr like a nightmarishly monstrous, cuddly cat, and leaned very carefully into the girl’s embrace. His enormous tail coiled around his body and around Aurora, nesting her against his side.

The soldiers stood still once again, and watched, slack-jawed, as this tiny, rosy-cheeked scrap of a girl had a dragon wrapped around her little finger, obviously under her command. In fact, everybody present stood silent, the only sound being that of Aurora’s sobs and Diavals’s purring.

Until Maleficent- the only one apparently not noticing the dragon’s awakening up to that point- slowly, almost painfully stood up, fixed the dragon with a burning stare of exasperation-fueled rage, and whispered in a gravelly voice that made Phillip suddenly contemplating scurrying under the dragon’s wing and staying there for the time being: “How long have you been awake?”

The dragon blinked at her and shrugged his right wing.

“ _You_. You impossible, infuriating fool of a bird. You have been awake _all this time?”_

Magic, green and gold, started to swirl around her fingers. Her wings bristled and she shook them off violently, grimacing with pain but continuing: “I thought I couldn’t wake you. I thought you were unconscious. I thought I didn’t heal your ridiculous head well enough. And you knew that- and you were pretending to sleep, listening to us fools, squabbling over your sorry hide- but _this_ , this glowing flea calls you ugly- “ at that she pointed at the blonde pixie, who made a scandalized face- “- and only _then_ you decide to object?”

With every accentuated word, the green magic around her seemed to grow stronger and stronger, and the pixies quickly scattered away, and Phillip knew that he’d be well advised to do the same, if Aurora wasn’t right there, in the dangerous proximity of that malevolent force, and he was suddenly gripped by panic-

“Oh, do calm down, godmother. He's all right. That’s all that matters.”, Aurora’s tear-stained face suddenly snapped up, and she wiped the snot away with her sleeve with a healthy, hearty sniff.

At Aurora’s voice, the fairy did seem to...simmer down a bit. But she was still was shooting angry daggers from her eyes at the dragon, who for his part seemed utterly unconcerned about the fact that the most powerful known magical creature in existence seemed ready to tear him apart, piece by feathered piece. His golden eyes didn’t have the ferocious look that Phillip expected from such a monstrous beast. Rather, thew twinkled with intelligence and warmth of a sentient being as he looked at his mistress. His gigantic tail moved, uncoiled, and came behind the irate fairy, whose hands were balled into furious fists, and whose color seemed to have drained entirely from her face, save her lips, which made her look like she had been feasted on blood. The dragon’s tail nudged gently at the fairy’s feet, until she relented at last and crossed those few steps that were between them. Once at his side, next to Aurora, she knelt down, and while she didn’t embrace the large creature like Aurora did, her hand went to caress the dragon’s mane of feathers. Phillip wasn’t certain if it was his watering eyes, or the fearsome fairy’s hand really did tremble while reaching out. Her face was still like a stone sculpture, though, and so was the rest of her body. It must have been a trick of light.

Then, the dragon’s tail encircled them both, holding them incredibly gently in what was an unmistakable equivalent of an embrace, and one so loving, that a strangest thought crossed Phillip's mind: _so, this is how a family hug looks like. This is how a loving family holds on to one another. This is how a touch of a parent should be._

As he was getting slowly back to his feet, Phillip felt a pang of envy in his chest. It was an unfamiliar emotion for him, and it took him a moment to recognize it for what it was, and once he did, he immediately felt profound shame. But he couldn’t help himself. How would it feel, to have him mother’s arms around him? As long as he could remember, she never touched him, aside for a perfunctory peck on his cheek. His father, bless him, was infinitely warmer, but while he did occasionally offer an affectionate squeeze of Phillip’s shoulder, particularly when Phillip had been performing well in his studies, and even a hearty bear hug back then when Phillip had been a child, this kind of...tender togetherness was entirely missing from his family. In fact, up until this moment, Phillip didn’t know such thing existed. A pain seared through his chest, and he suddenly wished that Maleficent had been a little bit more thorough when she had knocked him away. Had he been injured, perhaps somebody would wrap their arms around him as well, and he, too, would know...

He shook himself in disgust. What a ridiculous line of self-pitying thoughts. Childish and selfish. This amazing, kind girl needed his help, the people in this castle needed his help, and he was wasting his time thinking ridiculous, infantile thoughts.

Aurora slowly stood up first, one hand on the dragon’s temple, the other on the fairy’s shoulder. (Had Phillip thought her to be a trickster of any sort, he’d think she had assumed that position deliberately, so that the soldiers would hopefully be impressed by her casualness with the both fearsome creatures. But certainly, such a kind-hearted, innocent, sweet-looking girl couldn’t be that...cunning? If he was to believe that, he’d be ready to believe she ‘d been raised by foxes. Or ravens.)  
She looked at commander John (whose bandaged face looked like it needed redressing of the wound) and said in a quiet, firm voice: “My family is no threat to any of you. I swear. I swear on everything I hold dear. It is over.”

There was silence. It stretched for some time.

The castellan could barely speak, and knowing that, Phillip felt a decent amount of respect for the man when he finally stepped forward and managed to pronounce, loud and relatively clear:

“The king is dead. Long live the queen!”

Alongside the immeasurable feeling of pride for this incredible young lady, Phillip was acutely aware of the sad irony of the fact that among all of the incredible, magical things he had witnessed tonight- fairies, dragons, pixies, spells undone, castles crumbled, lives saved and lives lost- the most extraordinary of all for him was the sight of a small, mismatched family sharing a comforting embrace.

  
oOo

The last stars had given way to sunlight by the time the excitement in the castle had settled down. The uninjured soldiers had retreated (except for the four watchmen at the walls- better safe than sorry), the injured had long been settled in the infirmary, and the letters were written to the families of the two unfortunate casualties. That was the one thing which Aurora couldn’t manage on her own. She just couldn’t find the words, and ultimately accepted Lord Ortolan’s help in composing the letters.

And Maleficent had grew a thick, impenetrable – looking canopy of tightly woven branches to hide her dragon’s huge form, under which she disappeared with him as well, and where Aurora had decided to finally retreat, once she was too tired that she could no longer walk straight. Lord Ortolan insisted in vain that she remains in the castle.

Phillip walked her to the large dome-like shelter. The obviousness with which it was a product of a sentient mind, rather than a natural structure, was a bit unnerving. But aurora had insisted that he finally greets her fairy family _properly_.

The thought was far more alarming than her earlier request to hold down an injured, trashing dragon. His stomach was making nervous churns, and he caught himself seeking the comfort of her smile just like she had been seeking his own throughout the night. And she didn’t disappoint. Not only she offered him an exhausted, yet undoubtedly warm smile; she also caught him by the hand, and now he was following her with stomach full of hot stones and legs full of cottonballs.

“Godmother, it’s me”, Aurora called quietly, and the invisible force parted the branches aside. Inside, Phillip spotted the black- clad fairy lying on the ground, wrapped in her feathers, tucked under the dragon’s enormous leathery wing. As fearsome and terrible she had looked before, now she appeared rather…fragile, like a small wounded bird, compared to the dragon’s towering mass. And she was probably aware of that, because the second she spied Phillip behind Aurora’s back, she bolted right up, wings spreading wide, and the small wounded bird suddenly became a bloodthirsty eagle.

“What is he doing here?” she growled, head held high, and Phillip made a decent step back. Before he could say anything in his defense, Aurora pulled him back and said: “Godmother, we have just made peace with humans, remember? Now, I know that a formal introduction is a moot point now, but Phillip here- whose help tonight was enormous, and for which I am incredibly grateful- wanted to escort me here and to make sure that you are comfortable and safe.”

 _Did I?,_ Phillip swallowed uneasily under the fairy’s penetrating stare. But the last thing he wanted was to appear uncertain. A lifetime of dealing with his mother- and jumpy horses- had taught him better. He nodded curtly and said: “My apologies. It was not my intention to disturb your peace. If I can be of any help, please let me know.”

Maleficent continued fixing him with unmoving stare which had him seriously wondering if she was going to turn him into stone. “Doubtful”, she said, lips barely moving.

“We are incredibly lucky that he happened to be in Perceforest today”, Aurora continued to desperately try to coax a positive response from her godmother. In Phillip’s opinion, she would have more luck at squeezing a drop of water from a fistful of desert sand. “Remember how he tried to help me with Diaval after we fell? Right before you…you know, blasted him away? Wasn’t there something you would like to say to him?”

Maleficent arched an eyebrow. “Consider yourself lucky?”

“Godmother! You are supposed to apo- ”

“It’s all right, Aurora”, Phillip tried to defuse the conversation that he felt was destined to go south quickly, “it’s understandable. I hope that, uh…the big fellow is all right.”

The big fellow had his eyes closed and appeared to be asleep again. Both women looked at him, Aurora anxiously, Maleficent stone-faced.

“He is all right, isn’t he, godmother?” Aurora came closer to caress the dragon’s scaly snout. “Why is he sleeping again?”

“I put him to sleep.” Maleficent’s voice was impassive.

“Why?”

“He was in pain.”

“Oh.” Aurora’s face scrunched up empathically. “Oh, my poor pretty bird. I though that you…that he’s healed well enough?”

“His life is no longer in danger, and he should make full recovery.” Maleficent said very quietly. “But there are…limits… to what magic can do.”

Aurora cracked her fingers anxiously. “I would feel much better if he could tell us how he feels. Couldn’t you give him back his human form? So he can speak?”

“Speak?” a surprised word escaped Phillip, and two pairs of eyes turned to him. He blushed. “Apologies. But I though he was…er… a raven?”

“He is often a human”, Aurora smiled fondly. Her whole face brightened. “When godmother makes him so.”

“And he can speak?”

“Tirelessly”, Maleficent drawled out dryly.

“Forgive me for bringing this up again, but I have to ask. Would it be possible for him to be a human now? So that the people can see that he’s truly not a threat anymore? That he’s a reasonable being which can be talked with?”

“And it would be easier to take him home to the Moors”, Aurora accepted quickly. “You said that the raven body is too fragile for him to be in now- what about a human? And he could talk.”

Phillip though to have heard Maleficent muttering ‘ _my fear exactly_ ’, though he might have misheard it. Her unreadable expression still firmly on, she told Aurora: “I am still not certain that the transformation wouldn’t hurt him.”

“What would he want?”

The words were out before Phillip could stop them, and now he was again fixed with two sets of eyes, one alight with hope, another with anger.

“I mean”, he almost stuttered, blushing again, “if he’s a sentient creature, it should be his decision, should it not? After all, he is the one presenting a large target, should one of the soldiers decide to practice archery.”

“Haven’t we established that we were at peace?” Maleficent sneered bitterly.

“We are”, Phillip tried to placate her. “But better safe than sorry.”

“And being a pitiful human is somehow safer than being a dragon?” Maleficent said icily.

“He should be able to tell us what he needs to be to feel safer”, Aurora stated firmly. “Wake him, godmother.”

“He is my _servant_!” Maleficent gripped her staff with bony white fingers. A trace of anger could be heard in her voice, and this was the first time Phillip heard it to be addressed to Aurora. “He will do as I command.”

“Are you truly bringing that up now?” Aurora pointed a stern finger at her, entirely unimpressed, unlike Phillip, who wanted nothing more than sink in the ground without a trace. The ground, however, didn’t crack open, and so he remained where he stood, uneasy. “It’s about time that we hear what he has to say on his position here- and I want to talk to him and hug him properly! Please, godmother…”

Phillip wondered if Aurora had the natural talent of inadvertently bringing out the best in people, or was it a skill she had honed over the years. The look she gave the fairy would have melted glaciers; it certainly melted Phillip’s heart to the point of actual physical pain in his chest- and even the fearsome fairy was apparently not immune. Her face remained stone-hard, but something simmered in her eyes, turning them from poisonous green to a much softer, natural hue. After a moment of silence, she turned to look at the dragon and, with an uneasy air about her, made a gentle gesture with her hand.

Once again, Phillip was faced with the look of huge golden eyes that blinked several times before darting left and right, taking in the surroundings. When they locked on Aurora, the large feathery tip of his tail started batting against the ground in a manner of a happy puppy, only a puppy wouldn’t raise quite as much dust.

“Hello, pretty bird”, Aurora kneeled next to the enormous head which still rested on the ground, and she affectionately ruffled the feathers on his temple, each as long as her entire arm. “Are you in much pain? Godmother says you are still not yourself.”

The dragon shook his head no, brilliant eyes twinkling. His enormous mouth stretched wide in a monstrous grin which revealed sharp white teeth, each the size of a boulder, contrasting sharply with the jet- black of his skin and feathers. Despite his very inhuman appearance, every gesture spoke of intelligence and affection. Aurora responded in kind, leaning her forehead on his temple, while the huge creature purred like a very big, scaly, scary kitten.

“Remember Phillip?” Aurora asked wiping her teary eyes, and Phillip felt his stomach lurch at the sight of those intelligent eyes flashing right at him. “He was incredibly helpful tonight. I don’t think that the truce would be established without him. He tried to…to help you when we fell…remember?”

The dragon rose his head and sniffed the air in Phillip’s general direction. Puffs of smoke escaped the huge nostrils, but the feathered tail tip wagged enthusiastically again. Hoping it was a sign of goodwill, and counting on Aurora to prevent the dragon from turning him into a crackling, the prince made a very careful step forward and gave a small bow. “Hello…” he cleared his throat, because his voice was uncharacteristically high- pitched for reasons unknown, and tried again: “Hello. It is my honor to meet someone so…extraordinary.”

“Oh, wonderful”, Maleficent muttered under her breath. “Do please indulge him even more.”

But the tail wagged more vigorously, and the dragon nodded back, the monstrous toothy grin reaching his expressive eyes in a very humanlike manner. Aurora beamed at Phillip and beckoned him to come closer, and so he did, standing finally close enough to touch the creature which nobody that he knew ever saw or heard to exist, except in the legends of olden times. The dragon- _Diaval_ , Phillip repeated his name in his head; he was a person, as Aurora had pointed out, and not a mindless beast- emanated heat from his body, and Phillip could feel his scent now; dusty, earthy, ashy, warm. Diaval’s snout gently nudged Phillip in the chest in which his heart thundered with trepidation; golden eyes met Phillip’s, and the prince lay a slightly trembling hand behind one large nostril.

The dragons, he realized in amazement, were not slimy, or disgusting in any way to touch. Diaval’s skin was very dry, very hard and very warm, nearly hot. The scales it consisted of were so large that it felt like running his hand over a set of neatly arranged roofing tiles, under which cinders were smoldering. The heat was rising from between them. A large snout leaned into Phillip’s touch with a purring sound, causing Maleficent to roll her eyes and Phillip to grin like a child whose drams just came true. His heart felt like it was about to burst out of his chest, but no longer with fear, but with sheer, exhilarating joy.

_Look at me. I’m petting a dragon. A dragon! An honest-to-goodness, living, fire-breathing dragon. Oh, when I tell Percival of this. And father! Should I tell mother, though? My goodness, what a day; what a day of extraordinary things. I’m touching a DRAGON. And I’m still alive._

“See? Nothing to be afraid of!”, Aurora’s smile was so radiant, despite the dark circles around her eyes, that Phillip could only grin back like silly. She looked back, towards the castle, likely hoping that the canopy of vines and leaves was spread apart enough to allow the guards on the parapets to see it as well.

“I’m touching a _dragon_!” Phillip murmured, now bold enough to run his hand through the gigantic feathers on Diaval’s temple. They were surprisingly smooth, glossy and black. Aurora joined in caressing his other temple, beaming. Diaval didn’t seem to mind all the attention; quite the contrary, he let out a series of happy chirruping noises from his throat and wagged his tail tip.

“My apologies if I am interrupting your snuggling session with my self-preservation concerns”, Maleficent drawled out, granting them all a look of contempt under heavy eyelids, “but I vaguely recall there was an actual point to all this.”

Phillip had almost forgotten she was there. But now she stepped in front of Diaval, her wings making an irritated, jerking motion, and Phillip followed Aurora in stepping back and letting Maleficent fill Diaval’s entire field of vision. For all that he had enjoyed Aurora’s and Phillip’s attention, he still seemed to equally enjoy his mistress’ gloomy intensiveness, because the tell-tale tail tip kept raising dust on the ground, and those golden eyes looked at her with could be either mischievousness or intense joy.

“There had been some debate on whether to turn you into a man or not. A theory was concocted that the humans would feel less…threatened if your form would be less…manslaughtery.”

DIaval chirruped again, a high-pitched sound almost comically unsuitable for such an enormous creature. His wings spread only slightly and he shook his head; then, he produced a familiar croaking rumble from his chest, looking intently at his mistress. She took a moment to interpret the meaning of his sounds and body language, and when she did, she answered:

“No, I’m not turning you into a bird just yet. You are still not healed, and it’s too delicate a form for you to be in. I’m opposed to changing you at all, as I am not certain it wouldn’t cause you additional pain, but…” she gave the young couple an accusing look, “…apparently, a suggestion had been made that you should have a say in the decision.” A flare of her nostrils indicated just how ridiculous she thought the idea to be.

“Also,” she added, “the beastie wishes to talk to you.”

Diaval tilted his head exactly like a bird would, black feathers puffing up, and at that moment Phillip could see him exactly for a raven that everybody claimed him to be. Then, he nodded approvingly and fidgeted where he lay, as if bracing himself for what was to come.

“Your bones are not healed properly yet. You have lost a lot of blood, and I don’t know how a smaller form will react to that”, Maleficent said with a note of alarm creeping over her sharp features. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

He answered with a puff of smoke that he breathed at her feet, making her long black cloak billow back, revealing the leathery black, skin-tight outfit she was wearing the entire time- a battle uniform to minimize the effect of iron on her skin, Phillip presumed, which she still wouldn’t magic into something more comfortable.

“Fine”, she snarled. A wave of her hand made the vines and branches spread even more, granting the guards on the parapets a clear view, and she kneeled down next to Diaval’s chest. “This better be worth it, princeling.”

Suddenly, black smoke rose to envelop the dragon’s body, thicker and thicker, and Phillip stepped instinctively in front of Aurora, shielding her. She patted his shoulder reassuringly: “Don’t worry; it’s just godmother shapeshifting him.”

“Ah. Nothing remarkable, then”, Phillip said, slack-jawed, watching the black smoke collapsing into much smaller shape, quickly clearing out to reveal a black-haired, black-clad, sharp-nosed man which lay on his side and in Maleficent’s arms. He inhaled deeply and coughed convulsively, but a cry of pain cut the cough short, and his right hand went to clutch his left side. His eyes, wide and black and red-rimmed, watered in agony.

 _“What did I tell you?_ ” Maleficent yelled, her voice deep, the expression as close to unhidden fear as Phillip had ever seen it. “What did I tell you, you stupid, reckless, feather-brained fool of a bird?”

Her hand run over his left side, leaving a golden glow behind. He gave another agonized attempt to cough and another heart-wrenching moan of sharp pain. His eyes, almost unnaturally wide, black holes on his chalk-white, soot-stained face, overfilled with tears and they spilled, running pale traces in the dirt. Phillip’s chest tightened in sympathy. Having smoke in one’s throat and broken bones at the same time must have been a hellish ordeal. Under the half-open shirt, Phillip could see that man’s torso was covered in a huge purple bruise; there were bruises on his throat and neck as if he had been strangled; there were traces of blood on the left side of his face and in his hair.

“Oh, goodness”, Aurora cried, kneeling at Diaval’s side and taking his hand in hers, “oh, I’m so sorry, so sorry!” Her other hand went to caress the dragon- man’s black hair. Diaval tried to give her a reassuring smile, but it was a difficult thing to do while choking back another violent bout of uncontrollable cough and trying to clear his throat with minimal involvement of his chest muscles. Maleficent worked her golden magic over his chest and throat, her eyes closed in concentration, lips moving wordlessly.

“Not…sorry”, Diaval gasped out in a most hoarse, raspy voice that Phillip had ever heard in his life, “wanted…t’ talk.”

“Quiet now”, Aurora pleaded, biting her lower lip and squeezing his hand desperately. Her own eyes were quickly filling with tears. “Just show us- where does it hurt?”

Maleficent spread her wings to shield both Aurora and Diaval with them. She looked at Phillip and ordered in a chilly voice: “Princeling, this was your idea, so you might as well make yourself useful. Go fetch us some water. And make sure that it is clean, or you will be sorry indeed, because you will drink it first before he takes a single drop.”

Phillip didn’t object; in fact, he welcomed the opportunity to remove himself from what was obviously a vulnerable family situation. The moment he stepped out of the leafy shelter, the vines closed after him with such force that a gush of wind made his cape ripple around him.

oOo

“Godmother, this is unnecessary. Phillip won’t harm him.”

“I’ll be happy to do it, Aurora. Given the circumstances, it’s understandable”, Phillip assured them both.

Under Maleficent’s scrutinizing glare, Phillip poured himself some water, using a large pitcher and a goblet he had procured from the castle, and took a hearty sip. When he didn’t hesitate, and didn’t drop to the ground in death throes, she took the pitcher from him and poured water in a wooden cup which she had transmogrified from a twig.

Diaval the man was still resting in Maleficent’s lap, with exhausted-looking Aurora at his side. The girl was wiping his dirty face with the edge of her sleeve which itself desperately needed washing. His eyes were closed and Phillip would have thought he was under a sleeping spell again, if not for his convulsive twitching every time he would try to hold back a coughing fit, during which he would claw at his left side. Literally claw at it, Phillip noticed, because his fingernails were thick, dark grey to black at their pointy tips, and might be easily called claws rather than nails.

“Drink”, Maleficent brought the cup to the dragon-man’s cracked, dry lips, and the tremble of her hand was now very visible. She was almost as pale as he was; even her blood- red lips had lost some of their crimson. The dark circles were shadowing her eyes. She was, Phillip realized, exhausted beyond all limits, and she was operating on sheer willpower. Also, if he was any judge of character, she was terrified because of her feathered companion’s condition, though she would probably prefer having her pointy fingernails pulled out than admitting or showing that, at least in front of Phillip. It was really time for him to retreat to the castle and make sure they rest here together, peacefully, undisturbed.

“Thank…you”, Diaval’s low, hoarse voice surprised him. The pale man’s eyes fluttered open and looked at the fairy with such adoration and awe that Phillip felt even more of an intruder than earlier.

“Deplorable...state, you. Wings. Preen ’em.”

“And what do I have my servant for, then?” Maleficent’s voice was even and her face expressionless, but the most imperceptible caress of her finger over Diaval’s when his hand went to clumsily take the cup from her spoke of a whole story behind those haughty words, and a very different one. Of an entire lifetime spent together; of secrets shared in the darkness; of hours upon hours of heated arguments and long silences; of thousands of tender touches and bitter tears; of moments of laughter and moments of anger; of wounds mended and fears conquered and bonds forged in fires which nobody but them two could begin to understand- all that and more, showing in a briefest of moments, in a featherlight brush of pale fingers.

“Thank you”, Diaval repeated, voice ragged and pained, eyes bright and wide, shimmering.

“Drink, you fool”, Maleficent said quietly and helped him to take a swig from the cup, because it was obvious that he didn’t have it in him to hold it without spilling the water just yet. Diaval drank eagerly, fingers clawing around the cup, breath hitching with pain at every sip, but he drank nonetheless, eyes closing with an expression of relief, draining the cup in a matter of moments.

Phillip scratched the back of his head, a bit at loss at what to do now. The castle was quiet; the disappearance of the dragon hadn’t gone unnoticed among the guards, and just as planned, they were much less high- strung now, without his fiery threat at their door. It had been Diaval, after all, and not Maleficent, who had done the most damage, both to their troops and to the castle. As for Stefan’s untimely demise, Phillip was certain they all secretly celebrated it. So, no work for him to do there.

Aurora didn't need him either at this moment. She was snuggled on the ground, wrapped in a leafy blanket of magical origin, next to Diaval, occasionally squeezing his hand, and her eyes were growing heavy. The events of the day and night had finally wiped her off her small, bare feet. She needed rest, and if Phillip was feeling a pang of jealousy at seeing her lying so comfortably next to the dragon-turned-man, whispering something to him and holding him by the hand, that was, he knew, entirely his problem. After all, Phillip knew Aurora only for a day, even if he did feel like he’d known her his whole life. Diaval, from what Phillip gathered, had actually known her for her entire life. Phillip could only find comfort in a gut feeling that their bond was of sibling- or filial- nature. In fact, he would bet on it.

As his mother would tell him, the only trait fit for a king that he possessed was his ability to read people well. He lacked the firmness of a ruler, the ruthlessness of a warlord, the cunning of a strategist. But he did read people well. And he was, supposedly, good looking, though he hardly ever thought of himself that way, and when he did, he found it to be more of a hindrance than an asset. Due to his youth and his pleasant appearance, people never seemed to take him seriously; he felt like his entire purpose was to serve as a mannequin for a station which he had never earned, merely inherited; and even as such, according to his mother, he was doing a tolerable, but not a good job out of it.

And since yesterday...oh, since yesterday, his presence finally served a purpose, for the first time in his life. In helping Aurora, he had found an actual goal, something real and substantial, and according to her (and less so her fairy godmother), he was good at it. She had called his presence ‘ _incredibly helpful_ ’, which was a new thing for him altogether. It felt incredibly good. It felt even better that he was helpful to none other than _her_. (Oh, how would his mother sneer at his sudden, silly infatuation.) For the first time evrr, he felt truly important. Not only in the name or title, but in actual matter of the things, he made a difference.

But now, at this very moment, there was nothing left for him to do, other than to retreat to the castle, check for the twenty-sixth time that the soldiers are indeed placated and the inhabitants of the castle all well and accounted for, and to find himself a room to rest. Time to leave this peculiar little family, leave them to rest without the disturbing presence of a stranger that he truly was.

He cleared his throat, about to excuse himself at last, but Diaval’s eyes turned to meet his, and a lopsided smile on that pale face made Phillip feel a little less out of place. The creature might have changed the form, his eyes have changed the color and the shape, but those were unmistakably the same eyes which twinkled with warmth and intelligence on a dragon's body. Even his crooked grin was familiar, though the teeth were much less monstrous in this form.

“You, too...” Diaval fought back another strained cough, frowning with pain, “Thank you...Phillip. For...everything.” his voice sounded clearer now.

“His proper title is ‘ _prince Phillip of Ulstead’_ ”, the words sounded like taunting from Maleficent’s mouth. The sneering tone told him exactly what she thought of his kingdom, his title, himself and his species in general. “As of, the human prince, from the neighboring human kingdom. You should pay your dues to such a... trustworthy individual.”

It hurt, more than just a little, to be so openly ridiculed, despised and given such distrust, after spending all these long hours doing his very best to help the infuriating fairy. Well, helping her goddaughter, in essence, but still. And even more so after allowing himself a little pride at doing so. He told himself that it didn’t matter, that Aurora’s opinion mattered, but it still hurt, enough to leave him speechless.

Aurora, half-asleep by now, stirred and rubbed his eyes, muttering “Oh, godmother, for goodness’ sake, _please_...”, but Diaval interrupted her with another sickeningly painful hacking sound from his throat, after which he spoke in a rather leisurely manner: “Proper? He... _ouch_. He was petting me...half an hour ago. And I enjoyed it. I’d say...we’re past such formalities.”

Phillip was glad that Aurora had burst into laughter first, because he felt more comfortable doing the same. Diaval didn’t exactly laugh- he was hurting too much for it- but he gave Phillip a grin that was mischievous and apologetic at the same time. Taking satisfaction from Maleficent’s face, which assumed the expression of someone who had just taken a bite of a moldy bread, Phillip didn’t think that the apology was necessary, at least not to him.

“Is this why you wanted to talk?” Maleficent tiled her head at Diaval. “So you can make a fool out of yourself?”

“Apparently, that’s the only way... _ouch_...to make you turn me into a raven.”

“You are not going to irritate me into submission.”

“But I must. Philip didn’t even... _ow_... see my most beautiful...self.”

"What a loss."

"He’s right, you know”, Aurora chuckled to Phillip, her voice muffled under her leafy blanket. “And he has the softest, glossiest feathers of all ravens in the world.” Diaval beamed at this. “If you thought him impressive as a dragon, wait until you see him as a raven. If you find the right spot, he’ll let you pet him the whole day long.”

“Perhaps we can leave that for another day”, Phillip said hastily, when je judged Maleficent’s expression to grow somewhat... murdery. At an alarming rate. “When you are well enough. I believe I should leave you to rest. If I can offer any assistance, I’ll be at the cast...”

He didn’t finish his sentence before a vine came alive and pushed him out of the makeshift shelter. Once again, the branches slammed shut, rather than merely closed behind him, and he heard Aurora’s exasperated “ _Godmother!!!”_ from the inside.

But strangely, he didn’t mind. If anything, he was amused. Diaval’s carefree, friendly attitude counterbalanced Maleficent’s distrust, and he couldn’t help but wonder how those two starkly different individuals coexisted in what was obviously a tight, harmonic union.

Well, perhaps not _harmonic_ in the strict sense of the word...but their bickering had a completely different air about it than the malicious squabbles that he had witnessed numerous times between his parents, even if Maleficent did share some frightening similarities with his mother.

What strange, extraordinary folks, he thought. And what extraordinary things he had witnessed today. The things that legends were made of.

He saw magic. He kissed the most beautiful girl ever, though, given the circumstances, he probably shouldn't count that; in fact, he should apologize to her. He saw a king perishing in a battle, and a new queen rising. He saw a dragon. He _touched_ a dragon. And a dragon _enjoyed_ it, at his own admission, he thought with a chuckle.

He also saw a dragon, a fairy and a human girl sharing an embrace of such tenderness that he, the prince, could only dream of.

He also saw a single touch of a finger conveying more emotion in a single moment than he had seen his parents sharing during their entire marriage, all their days put together.

His mother prided herself in their wealth. But apparently something very important was missing from their lives, and Phillip had only now realized it.

How extraordinary.


	13. Influence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aurora just can't keep quiet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An early birthday present for angeldustjolie :)
> 
> *Burr the pigeon belongs to Ms.Black. He appears in "Heart of the Moors", along with lord Ortolan and Smiling John.

“Finally”, Aurora sighed from the back on her horse.

It felt like taking off a mountain of rocks off her back, being away from the castle. She hoped that Phillip will be able to keep commander John and lord Ortolan pacified until her return. The castellan was truly uneasy about letting their soon-to be crowned new queen to go alone into the Moors, following the fearsome horned fairy back into her lair, and Aurora felt bad for putting him in a precarious position. But lord Ortolan was another thing. The old counselor was filling her with such feeling of unease, like trying to chew a mouthful of sawdust. But then, she had next-to-none experience at dealing with fellow humans. He might be unlikeable, but she knew another person that wasn’t exactly the most charming of people, yet capable of limitless love…so perhaps she judged the counselor too soon.

Thoughts for another time. Right now, she could allow herself to enjoy being back home. Because the Moors, in these few months she had been allowed to be a part of them, had become more of a home than the old cottage ever was. Right now, she allowed herself to be thrilled and elated at the sight of all the fair folk who came to witness the return of their protector. 

Maleficent had left them wingless, dark and guarded; she was seen riding on the back of Diaval the horse just outside the Moors, heading for the castle. Now she was returning, whole, wings and all, as majestic as anything can be, her long brown hair flowing freely around her, and with Diaval the raven carried in her arms.

The fair folk had expected her return anxiously. She was seen from far away, and the moment she had flown over the wall of thorns, they started fluttering, buzzing, whispering. Those brave enough followed her; the others followed Aurora, who rode right after her on the least skittish mare she had been able to find in the caste’s stables. Wherever they went- Maleficent in the air, Aurora on the ground- everything went alive, alight; dew fairies, wallerbogs, pixies, foxkin, mushroom fairies, stone fairies, leaf fairies- the air and the ground became abuzz with magic, colors and movements. Even some of the stoic tree sentinels followed the crowds, the others remaining at their stations at the border. 

As excited as they were, all of the fair folk stopped before reaching Maleficent’s home tree, giving her a wide berth when she started her descent, the first time in seventeen years. The gusts of wind that her wings made were as powerful as they had ever been, and Aurora could see that many of the fairies were crying, or looked as if they were about to. There were excited whispers, choked sobs and muffled squeaks of joy and disbelief. Aurora, too, halted her mare and dismounted, her heart as gleeful as any of the fair folk. 

“They are back!”

“Her wings!”

“What happened?”

“Are we still at war?”

“Oh, she’s beautiful!”

“Look at her!”

“Is Diaval alive?”

The last question made Aurora’s head to spin around and look at the one who had asked it- an anxious-looking young water nymph who often teased Diaval and sprayed him with water. 

“Of course he’s alive”, Aurora reassured her, watching Maleficent settling herself on a large branch, sturdy enough to carry ten fairies her size. The bird in question was still safely tucked in her arms. He didn’t move, and knowing how lively and energetic he always was in his bird shape, Aurora understood the confusion. “He’s been hurt, but he’s better already. Godmother will take care of him.”

The said godmother had perched herself at the entrance of her tree abode like an enormous bird of prey. Her cold, piercing stare encompassed the entirety of the assembled crowd, and her wings- still dusty, still ragged from the years of misuse- fluttered. 

“Well?”, she drawled out, “what are you all gawking at? Have you never seen wings before?”

And her impossibly red lips stretched into a mischievous smile. After which she disappeared into her home of thickly braided branches and vines, wings dragging over the rough bark.

The whispers and the squeaks were intensifying in volume, and within moments, erupted in full- blown laughter and cheers. The fairies crowded around Aurora, fluttering around her, tugging at her petticoats, taking seats on her shoulders and on her head. 

“Tell us!” they chirruped, sang, cried. 

“What happened?”

“Have you seen it all?”

“Are you all right?”

“Why was the castle on fire?”

“What happened to the king?”

“Where were her wings?”

“How did she find them?”

Aurora had planned to follow Maleficent into her nest, but the sheer joy of the fair folk was infective; the trust and adoration and the awe in their eyes making her heart flutter as if it had sprouted wings, too. She concluded that her godmother would likely prefer that the focus of attention is diverted from her until she and Diaval settle back home, and she sees to his condition.

Aurora glanced at the fairy’s home, and decided that a little peace was most likely what both Maleficent and Diaval needed. So the young queen settled on the ground, the magical creatures settling around her as well, and begun to talk.

oOo

The sun was high in the sky when Aurora was finally able to excuse himself from the Moorlanders’ rapt attention and climb nimbly up her godmother’s tree. The branches parted to grant her entrance before she opened her mouth to call, so she came in and smiled at the sight before her.

Diaval was in his human form again, settled in Maleficent’s nest, huddled in a comfortable looking blanket, lying on his right side. When he had caught Aurora’s fall and made himself a gigantic dragon-shaped cushion for her, he had landed on his left side, and the horrendous sound of his wing bone snapping still haunted Aurora. He had also broken several ribs on the left side, cracked the left side of his skull and broken his tailbone. Even though Maleficent had done a miraculous work of healing his broken bones together, he was still sore and favored his left side. Also, he avoided sitting, to the point of being ridiculous. 

Right now, he was lying still, watching unblinkingly at Maleficent’s now-winged back. He was staring so fixedly that Aurora thought he was perhaps sleeping with one eye open, as she knew he sometimes did, even in his human form. 

“There’s my fearsome dragon”, Aurora whispered to him fondly.

He blinked, forcing himself to look away from Maleficent, and Aurora now saw that he was sporting a drunken, happy smile, the same that she had seen him having many times during the past few days. More precisely, every time when he’d look at Maleficent’s wings. Aurora herself was amazed by them, but Diaval looked to be beyond amazed; he was stunned, starstruck. Aurora had noticed since her first day in the Moors, the first day Maleficent showed herself to Aurora, that he tended to gaze at his mistress adoringly, when she wasn’t looking. But now he seemed almost physically affected. Even if- it couldn’t escape Aurora’s notice- he never attempted to reach out and touch them. 

Well, at least not in front of Aurora. She had her suspicions about those two and what exactly transpired between them when nobody was looking, and the rumors in the Moors were as rampant as they were hushed. But since neither Maleficent nor Diaval ever told her anything, Aurora respected their silence and never asked.

Even if she was unbearably curious.

Even if Maleficent, too, seemed to occasionally set her unfathomable gaze at her servant, and to keep it there for as long as he wasn’t looking. It wasn’t nearly as obvious or easily readable as Diaval’s, but Aurora saw it.

Even if Aurora had heard her, when Diaval the dragon had been lying broken and bleeding in front of the castle, calling him that…

“Not as fearsome now, I’m afraid”, Diaval said quietly. He shifted uncomfortably under his blanket, which slid down his bare shoulder, exposing the ghastly pale skin covered with old scars and new bruises, black and purple turning green. He quickly pulled the blanket up and covered himself. 

“How did it feel, to be a bird again?” Aurora tried not to cringe guiltily at the sight. Why did she have to go and run like mad through the clearly damaged part of that cursed castle? As if she could have made the difference. As if she could have been of any help.

The only thing that she managed to do was to get Diaval seriously injured.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but dreadful.

Apparently, mistress was correct at her assumption.”

He sighed as deeply and dramatically as his ribs allowed. “My most beautiful form is also my most delicate one.”

“It does have its benefits, though”, Maleficent said, her back still facing them. She was handling several bowls and pitchers at what seemed to be a table-like structure growing directly from the wall. “He was blissfully uncomplaining during the whole flight.”

“I was _unconscious_ during the whole flight”, Diaval observed.

“Exactly.”

“Oh, please. You would die of boredom if not for yours truly.”

“I would have died”, the fairy turned only slightly after a single heartbeat, only enough for Diaval to glimpse a tug of an enigmatic smile at her lips. “That much is true.”

Diaval answered with a lopsided smile, satisfied, and the memory came to Aurora again: Maleficent, kneeling next to the dragon, caressing him, her tears falling on his scaly skin, whispering: _My dear friend. My love. My love…_

Aurora shook her head. Not her place. Not her place to ask. If they had something to tell her, they would. Even if she was dying to know the truth; for that to be true…

“Beastie”, Maleficent beckoned her, finally turning to face them, revealing the contents of the table to be bowls of nuts, dried mushrooms, honey and soup. “Come over. Let’s eat. We have business to attend to afterwards.”

“Are those black nuts?” Diaval crooked his neck to see better. “Didn’t you say you didn’t have them here?”

“So I said.”

“You had a cache here and you kept that from me?” he sounded almost childishly wounded. 

Maleficent eyed him knowingly. “It is because I kept that from you that I still _have_ a cache.”

“You believe I’m so gluttonous that I would raid your entire stash?”

“I don’t have to _believe_.”

Diaval’s pale cheeks blossomed with pinkish hue of embarrassment. “That was only once, and it was winter!”

“It is winter now.”

“That was a harsh winter. And you were nowhere to be found. Would you prefer that I starve to death?”

The answer came in a form of a bowl of purple soup that levitated from the table to where Diaval lay. He took one look at it and scrunched up his nose. “Urgh. Do I have to eat this?”

“It is a particular recipe which includes certain healing herbs. It should be beneficial for blood replenishment.” 

“Should?” the raven-man eyed the concoction skeptically. He seemed to have sunk deeper into the nest when the spoon in the bowl came seemingly alive and stirred the purple liquid. “Can’t I have some black nuts instead?”

“You can. When you have eaten my painstakingly prepared brew. I will not allow those valuable ingredients to go to waste because a bird decided to act obnoxiously. I expect my efforts to be productive.” 

Aurora would have laughed at their both expressions- Maleficent’s stern determination, Diaval’s petulant defiance- if her mouth weren’t full of food at the point. She was starving. Neither of them have had a proper meal in days. 

“I’ll have you know that I protest vehemently”, Diaval slowly, painfully propped himself up, causing the covers to slide from his torso again. He didn’t have the time to fix it himself, because an invisible force moved the blankets, throwing them over his thin, battered frame. The look of gratitude that he gave to his mistress was in stark contrast with his protests, just as her own look of tense uneasiness at his condition was in stark contrast with her uncaring words. Aurora’s eyes darted from one stubborn creature to another, and she wondered, not for the first time, if those two had a coded language of their own in which they spoke the exact opposites of what they felt, or were they spontaneously being difficult. And, of course, did both of them see how the other was looking at the other- see it how Aurora saw it, or were they both blind as well as annoying?

Diaval took the bowl of suspiciously looking liquid, stirred it carefully as if expecting it to suddenly take form and jump for his throat (which, on second though, might not have been a completely ungrounded concern, judging by Maleficent’s intense stare), and, with a shudder, shoved a spoonful in his mouth.

“How is it?” Aurora was curious. She took more mushrooms in her bowl. 

Diaval took another spoonful before answering: “Not terrible”, and proceeded to slowly stir and eat the purple brew. Maleficent, a victorious smile on her lips, finally paid some attention to nuts and honey in her own bowl.

Hungry as they were, they proceeded to eat in silence, when Aurora saw the spoon falling from Diaval’s unsteady hand, clattering in the half- empty bowl, which also swayed dangerously. Diaval set the bowl aside, the purple liquid churning and almost spilling.

“Diaval?” Aurora asked through the food in her mouth, alarmed. But he offered a lopsided smile, closing his eyes.

“Never worry, little one. I’m full, it’s all.”

But Maleficent fixed him with a scrutinizing glare. After a moment, she got to her graceful feet, and in one gliding step and a ruffle of her powerful wings, she was at the raven-man’s side. She knelt down and picked up the discarded dish.

“You are full, you say?”

Diaval’s eyelids fluttered open to give his mistress an apologetic, wounded look. “I can’t, mistress. I’m sorry.”

Maleficent offered him the empty spoon. “Hold this for me, will you?”

Giving the panicked impression of a cornered animal, Diaval reluctantly picked up the offered item.

“Hold it up.”

He did. A few moments trickled by in silence in which Aurora watched Maleficent and Diaval staring defiantly at one another, her expression stern, his determined, before his hand started trembling, than shaking violently, and finally swaying and dropping to his lap. It took a moment for Aurora to realize what had just happened: he didn’t have sufficient strength even to feed himself, and Aurora’s heart clenched; the food lost all of its appeal. The spoon fell to the floor of branches, tumbling, and Diaval gave it a dirty look, as if it had done him a personal offence.

“I don’t appreciate being lied to”, Maleficent said quietly, dangerously. But Diaval stubbornly held to the remnants of his dignity and refused to look away or even pretend to be sorry. 

“I don’t appreciate having the decision on my most basic body functions being taken away from me!”

“I thought you didn’t want to starve to death.”

“If I do, that’s my call, not yours.”

“Diaval”, Maleficent’s eyes narrowed ominously, “I have plenty of work ahead of me. I don’t need you to be difficult now, on top of everything.”

Not bothering to wait for an answer, Maleficent picked up the spoon, scooped up a spoonful of the purple brew and brought it to Diaval’s mouth. He turned his head away. Unhealthy redness colored his pale face.

“Diaval, please”, Aurora begged before Maleficent could lose her temper altogether and say or do something they all would regret; “please, pretty bird. You need to eat better to get your strength back. You know that. Come on. _Please_.”

She batted her eyelashes for good measure. If being manipulative was the only weapon in her arsenal which could coax him into behaving rationally, so be it. If only he would at least look at her. 

“Do you remember when I was little and you fed me blackberries?” Aurora pressed on in a sweetest voice she could manage. “I couldn’t reach high enough and I was determined to get my dress and my hands all torn up on the thorns. You pulled at my dress until I stepped away from the bush, and then you perched on top of it and picked the berries and carried them to me, one by one. Popped them right into my mouth.” She smiled fondly at the memory. “Do you remember?”

He nodded, still looking away. But a hint of a smile appeared on his tense, guarded face.

“Will you let us feed you now? For me?” she pleaded, kneeling down next to Maleficent, whose expression slipped for the shortest of moments, and what Aurora saw there was raw, undiluted fear. It made Aurora feel as if the food in her stomach had turned into heated rocks. She had somehow held on to the belief that her godmother knew exactly what was happening with her raven and what exactly needed to be done. But in that fraction of a moment, Aurora saw the truth etched hard on the lines of the fairy’s face, and the truth was that she was panicking. Which made Aurora nauseous with fright.

“Will you let us feed you, pretty bird? Please?” she repeated, and didn’t bother to hide the tremor in her voice. “I’d never forgive myself if you’d go hungry because you were hurt while saving me. _Please_.”

Finally, he looked at her, and she wished that he hadn’t, because his eyes were full of tears and wounded pride. She knew without doubt that every avian fiber in his body rebelled against being seen in this condition, too weak to even hold a spoon, and wanted only to hide himself as much as possible, or pretend that he was all right. Unfortunately, neither was bound to be.

Maleficent tried again to offer him a spoonful of her brew, and this time, he opened up. 

Aurora tried his best to give him a reassuring smile, but wasn’t certain that she had done a good job out of it, because her own eyes were filling with tears, and she wasn’t accustomed at faking happiness when she wanted to weep. Especially since she hardly ever felt the need to weep. Angry at herself for her lack of control, she patted Diaval’s leg awkwardly and turned back to the table, both to spare him the additional embarrassment of being watched in what he perceived to be a deeply humiliating situation, and to spare both Maleficent and Diaval from worrying over Aurora’s state of mind on top of all their other worries. Pretending to keep eating, she listened to the sound of the spoon against the bowl as Maleficent fed Diaval like a hatchling. 

“It’s the blood loss”, Maleficent spoke quietly, to all of them, or perhaps to no-one in particular. “I can’t seem to fix that, not even with magic. I was able to help with the broken bones, cuts and contusions, but I cannot wrap my magic around the blood loss. And having been in raven form made it worse. I shouldn’t have turned you for the trip home. I knew it was a mistake. My stupid mistake.”

The tone of Maleficent’s voice was strikingly similar to the one she had used upon awakening Aurora, and the uncharacteristic emotion in it made both Aurora to turn around and look at her. She saw Maleficent was wiping a tear off Diaval’s face with her long, bony finger, and he was leaning into her touch with the impression of a drowning man finally drawing air in his lungs. All of his tension, embarrassment, pain, defiance, humiliation, stubbornness- all vanished in thin air. He looked as if his soul was saved.

 _They should hug_ , Aurora thought, feeling free to wipe the tears from her eyes now, when they were both unlikely to notice them. _They really should hug now. Why don’t they hug?_  
_Well, perhaps because they don’t want anybody peeking over their shoulders when they do_ , a thought struck her, and just when she was about to stutter out an attempt of an excuse and wiggle out of there, it was too late. Maleficent stood up, composing herself back to her usual regal self, leaving Diaval to gaze at her with longing adoration.

“Black nuts?” the fairy asked, but Diaval shrugged unenthusiastically. 

“Too nutty.” He said, suddenly disinterested at one of his favorite foods. “I don’t suppose you have, uh, some meat there?”

Maleficent shook her head ruefully. “I’m sorry.”

“I can arrange a supply of meat from the castle!” Aurora beamed, wanting desperately to help, somehow. Anyhow.

“Oh, don’t hurry back there just yet only because of that!” Diaval pleaded earnestly. “I’ll live until tomorrow. Cross my heart.”

Aurora almost flinched away at the thought of needing to return to the castle. But return she will have to. It was a cloud that hung above them all, and she regretted mentioning anything about it.

“But”, Diaval continued in a conspiratory voice, the one she knew well was meant to take her mind away from her worries, “I don’t suppose you would go and dig some earthworms for this old raven?”

Aurora giggled, the cloud momentarily feeling much lighter. Only Diaval could take on the role of a comforter, and in a blink of an eye to that, when he was supposed to be the comforted one. She was about to say that she would love to dig up the mountain for him, when Maleficent cut her off: “We are not going to dig for earthworms.”

“But, godmother- “

“There are nuts, honey, mushrooms, beets and eggs. There’s plenty of food. We are not going to dig for _earthworms_ on top of it all.” 

“But, mistress- “

“But, godmother- “

“We are not digging for earthworms!”

oOo

They were digging for earthworms.

Well, Aurora was digging. Maleficent merely waved an exasperated hand, and a decent chunk of earth was ripped from the ground by an invisible force, than overturned and slammed back down. Aurora happily squeaked and got to her knees, nimble fingers picking up the slippery little creatures which simply weren’t in luck today. 

Maleficent stood with her usual uninterested air about her, as if nothing had changed- and yet, everything did. Aurora grinned every time her majestic wings would flutter. The fairy was still leaning on her staff; whether for balance or out of habit, Aurora couldn’t tell. And it didn’t feel appropriate to ask. But then again, neither did ‘ _are you and Diaval lovers?’_ , or ‘ _am I making the right choice, accepting to be the Queen of Perceforest?_ ’, or ‘ _isn’t it funny that I feel like I’ve known Phillip my whole life_ ’, or ‘ _we can show them all that humans and Fair folk can be friends, can’t we?’_

So many questions, so many insecurities. Every unanswered question was a delicate eggshell on which she needed to tread upon with utmost care.   
She could simply be silent, of course. 

Not for long, of course- Maleficent said once that it’s all Diaval’s fault; that she had been exposed to his mindless chatter during her most delicate formative years- but she could. If she tried. Tried hard.

“He’s going to be all right, godmother, isn’t he?” 

Well, nobody said she had to try hard just _now_. Besides, of all the questions, this one bothered her the most. Everything else felt more distant at the moment, but Diaval’s condition was a pressing matter; one that made her squirm inside her skin. 

The fairy looked at her with inscrutable expression. “Yes.”

“Well, how…how much longer should it take for him to get better?”

Silence. And a terrible one to that, because Aurora realized that Maleficent didn’t know. She had no way of knowing- no prior experience with exsanguinated birds or humans, no theoretical knowledge, nothing. 

“Godmother…should I fetch a doctor from the castle? He’s a really nice gentleman, and- “

“ _Absolutely not!”_ Maleficent’s eyes turned stone-hard, and so did her voice. “No human charlatan will lay a hand on him, unless they wish to lose it!” 

“All I’m saying”, Aurora said pleadingly, catching the earthworms that were trying to wriggle out of the bowl she’d been collecting them into, “is that he might know about …non- fairy maladies a bit more than…”

“Beastie. No.”

The bristled feathers told Aurora to drop the matter. Sighing, she tried a different approach: “But there must be something we could do for him? It must be unbearable, being so helpless, so wounded, in pain.”

Maleficent stared in the distance and said after a heartbeat, flatly: “Unbearable would be an improvement.”

“Didn’t he…didn’t he feel better as a dragon? Could you perhaps turn him into one again until he’s better?”

“Beastie”, Maleficent exhaled slowly, “he was indeed feeling better as a dragon. But still, he would need help. He needs help with most basic things. He needs...he needs assistance relieving himself. It’s humiliating for him even as it is, when those matters can be dealt with in privacy. It would be much more impractical and...less likely to remain private if he would be the size of a small hill.”

Aurora’s cheeks burned as if she was the one suffering such humiliation. She wished she was the one instead of him. It was her fault, all her fault. Why did she ask at all?

“Also”, Maleficent went on, “dragons eat a lot. A lot of meat. Which has to come from somewhere. I doubt that we would succeed in our plan to reunite humans and fair folk if I were to decimate herds of sheep on daily bases.”

Aurora nodded. She stared at the worms in her bowl, as if fascinated by them. Of course it would be impractical. She should have thought of that. Why did she have to be so...silly? Just a silly girl. That was all she was. All she had ever been. An ordinary, silly girl, swept up in an adventure which just carried her along with the stream; a young, silly, reckless creature, too small for the large shoes she was trying to fill. How was she supposed to be a queen? What was she thinking? 

“Finally”, Maleficent added, “each change of forms drains what little strength he has left. He is this weak now because I had shifted him into a bird this morning. I judged that he would be able to withstand it. But I made a mistake. I should have carried him here in his human form. He is not that heavy; he barely has any flesh on his bones left.” Her wings shuffled uneasily, and she added, quietly: “I should have thought better of what he might need of me now, after all these years he had spent thinking about what I...”

Maleficent's mouth thinned, lips pressing together as if in pain. She leaned heavily on her staff, and Aurora thought, for a horrible moment, that she, too, would sway and faint- that the trip home was too much for her as well, and not only for Diaval. But she didn’t. She just gripped the staff harder, and Aurora realized that her pain wasn’t of the physical kind. Which didn’t make it any less unbearable.

“I’m so sorry, godmother”, Aurora whispered, torn between the need to hug the fairy, to share their common pain, and the realization that the fairy likely wouldn’t appreciate being touched with such intensity. “It’s my fault. All that happened was because of me. If I didn’t fall from- “

“No, beastie.” Maleficent’s voice was resolute. “You are one person entirely innocent of anything that happened. Even...” she paused. “Even that stubborn old charcoaled peacock isn’t entirely innocent.”

“How so?” Aurora had to smile through tears at the fairy’s description of Diaval. 

Maleficent's eyes twinkled, even if her mouth was still pressed in a painfully thin curve. “He insisted, long ago, that I visit a certain little beast in a cottage. And he got me loving her.”

Aurora’s smile widened. She didn’t know all the details. But she did know it was Diaval who had cared for her first, even before Maleficent. Her earliest memories were those of warm black wings hovering over her, and a warm cooing sound, soft and calming; the only lullaby she had ever known.

“I suppose he has earned a hug”, she said softly. 

“I know that you usually hug him with a force of a ram troll, but do mind his ribs this time.”

“I meant you.”

The change in Maleficent’s attitude was almost comical, and a bit sad, in Aurora’s opinion. She straightened out to her full height, cocked her head and said flatly: “I don’t hug.”

“Not ever?” Aurora pressed. “Not even him? After all those years?”

Maleficent eyed the handful of earthworms Aurora was trying to contain within the bowl. “I believe that would be enough”, and Aurora knew she wasn’t referring only to the number of worms.

“ _Not even for special occasions?_ ” Aurora called in vain after Maleficent’s large wings which carried the fairy back in the canopy of her tree, leaving Aurora behind in a gust of wind. 

_Not even those that you call your love?_ she almost yelled, but bit at her lip. She was a bit angry, a bit sad, a bit confused, and a strange little bit amused. She was not sure if it was because of her inexperience with other people, or was it really that the fairy was a bit...impossible?

oOo

The day had gone by too soon. 

Maleficent had taken Aurora for a patrol through the Moors, and the fairy had almost imperceptibly slipped into the background, leaving Aurora to talk to the Moorlanders, to ask them how they have been, to tell them the story of the battle in the castle, and how a treaty was established with humans. Occasionally, Maleficent would leave Aurora to chat with the fairies and pixies, while she would fly to back to her tree to check on Diaval, and then she would return, each time looking a bit more relaxed. They went even to the Dark Pond, where Aurora had never been to before, and there she was introduced to ram trolls and hog trolls, and was given a quick lesson on the toxic plants which grew there- some with magical properties, some just ordinarily poisonous. 

Aurora loved every moment. Every creature. Even the dangerous ones had their own kind of beauty; a mysterious appeal. She wanted to know more. She didn’t want it to end.

But the end was near as the sun started its incline towards the west. The early evening found them back in the tree, Aurora talking animatedly with Diaval about their day. He was still lying in Maleficent’s nest, wrapped up in blankets, but looking much better than he did that morning. 

“There’s someone I’d like you to meet”, Diaval said when Aurora started looking around for some excuse to remain there a little while longer, even if the sun was getting alarmingly low. That got her attention. She had thought she had met every possible extraordinary creature the Moors had to offer.

“Your friend?” she beamed enthusiastically. “Who is it? A roc?”

Diaval laughed, though carefully so, clutching at his side. “Not exactly a friend, but he’ll do. An acquaintance. But a reliable one. And no, not a roc.”  
He made a cooing noise from the depth of his throat and tilted his head, listening. Aurora heard nothing out of ordinary, but Diaval instructed: “Step outside. He should meet you, if he knows what’s good for him.”

Never hearing him speaking that way of anybody, Aurora gave Diaval a puzzled look, but he just smiled happily back. Maleficent was of absolutely no help at all, sitting at the edge of the nest next to Diaval, expression unreadable. 

Aurora did as she was told, and she was greeted with a whoosh of snow-white wings of a most beautiful pigeon she had ever seen. His head was as black as Diaval’s; the rest of his body, pure white. He landed on a branch close to her and cooed. 

“Oh, you are so _beautiful!_ ” Aurora exclaimed, immediately rushing inside to get a handful of anything edible she could find and offering it to the bird. He fluttered to her hand, unafraid, and immediately begun pecking at the contents of her palm. “What’s his name?”

“He doesn’t have one that would be translatable in human or fairy speech.”

“Can I pet him?” she turned to Diaval, who merely shrugged and said: “I wouldn’t know. That’s between you two.” he suddenly sounded less than enthusiastic at the glee Aurora was presenting upon meeting his acquaintance. Maleficent eyed the raven- man, raising eyebrows and pursing her lips knowingly.

Aurora did as a certain raven once had taught her, a lifetime ago- offered her hand gently, and when the bird didn’t protest, she caressed his sleek cheek with her finger. “Oh, he likes me! Oh, he’s so adorable!”

“I wouldn’t say he’s all _that_ stunning”, Diaval said dryly, suddenly squinting at the pigeon as if contemplating him to become his next source of much-needed nutrients, “but he knows how to find his way to where he wants to go better than any bird I have ever met in my life, and that says something. He’s to go with you to the castle. If you ever need to send us a message, he’ll deliver it here instantly.”

“And he’ll go with me willingly?” Aurora adjusted her arm so that the pigeon could sit comfortably. His little feet were sliding down the smooth sleeve of her dress, and she giggled at the sensation of his small claws against her skin. “Ow, that tickles! Sticking to me like a burr, are you not?” she cooed at the lovely bird, who puffed his chest proudly and cooed back. 

“As willingly as his limited mind will allow him”, Diaval answered flatly, and Maleficent rubbed her nose to hide a smile which threatened to stretch her lips. 

“Oh, Diaval, you sound like godmother”, Aurora chuckled. “She must be rubbing off on you. Now, what would we call you, hmmm?”

“She is not...” Diaval cleared his throat, “...rubbing off on me.” (Aurora thought that he had whispered ‘often’, but if he did, it was hushed by a sudden flare of Maleficent’s wings.)

“Oh, you clingy little thing! A burr, I say” she laughed at the persistence with which the black-and-white bird gripped at her sleeve. Glancing back at Diaval, she answered: “Oh, come on- even if she did, nothing wrong with that. It’s bound to happen when people love one another as you two do, isn’t it?”

She had finally managed to detach her new messenger from her person and set him back at the branch, where he turned to preen his lustrous feathers. When she had turned to enter Maleficent’s home again, she was met with two pairs of eyes that watched her as if she had just given birth to a swarm of locusts. Diaval’s eyes darted from Aurora, to Maleficent, to the only exit available, and Aurora could have sworn that he’d hightail right out of there, if only he could as much as stand up without fainting. Maleficent was pale and unmoving, but her eyes were toxic green. 

“What?” Aurora asked, perplexed, stepping closer to them. It wasn’t as if she had asked them personal questions- she merely pointed out what was plain as day to her. And if she had hoped, secretly, that the little nudge she had given them would have them revealing exactly what kind of love did they share, she wasn’t obvious at all, was she? “Did I say something wrong? You do love each other, don’t you?”

“Um”, Diaval said, now paler than he had been in the morning when he nearly fainted from the extreme effort of holding a spoon, “I’m suddenly thirsty! You did so well, bringing me those juicy earthworms- would you perhaps- “

But Aurora couldn’t take Maleficent’s stony expression, simmering with what she could only guess that was irritation at best, anger at worst. “Godmother, why are you like that? I know how deeply you love, better than anyone- you woke me with _a true love’s kiss_ , for goodness’ sake- and you don’t have to tell me that you love one another, I can see that, and I even heard you telling Diaval that you loved him, when he got hurt, when he was a dragon...”

Diaval’s jaw dropped, and it would have been hilarious, if Maleficent didn’t rise from where she was sitting- or rather, jumping away from the nest as if it had suddenly caught fire- cutting Aurora off with a cold, purposeful voice: 

“I said nothing.”

Now Aurora’s jaw dropped. She had expected her godmother to perhaps avoid the subject, or change it, or scoff her slightly for poking her nose where it didn’t belong, but she didn’t expect outright denial. Being all but accused of being a liar, even less.

“What?” she stuttered, suddenly feeling small, confronted with Maleficent’s cold, green glare. Trying to remember that this was the look which very often graced Maleficent’s face wasn’t helpful. Because the hard, cold look had never before been for Aurora. “But- but I heard you! I know what I heard- are you telling me that I-”

“I said nothing.” Colder, quieter, firmer. And now Aurora was growing some anger of her own. Not only it wasn’t true; it wasn’t fair. Not only to Aurora, but much more so to Diaval. Because it was plain as a long, pointy nose on his face that he loved his impossible mistress with every heartstring in his fractured, bruised chest, and if there had ever been a person deserving of love, of knowing that he was loved _back_ , it was him. 

Aurora opened her mouth to argue, but Maleficent repeated before the girl could utter a word: _“I said nothing.”_

And when Aurora tried again to say something, anything, she felt a cold, calloused hand taking her own as delicately as if afraid of breaking her fingers. Diaval looked at her pleadingly- almost begging- and he squeezed her hand gently. 

_Leave it,_ the touch said. _Leave it. Please._

And she couldn’t refuse. Especially when Maleficent turned her back to them both, stepped out and left them without a word. A feather fell off one of her wings, and both Aurora and Diaval followed its slow, spiraling descent with fixed determination, because it was much easier to focus on that, then to face the consequences of what just happened. 

Diaval wasn’t letting go of her hand; rather, he was gripping it desperately, and she was returning the grip as hard as she could. Looking down at him, she saw his eyes, wide like saucers, their blackness seemingly filling the better part of his face, and she knew he wasn't merely upset; he was _terrified._ And she was to blame. Again.

“I didn’t think...” she tried, but her voice was shaking so badly, she couldn’t continue. Diaval attempted a shaky smile to reassure her, when in all righteousness he should be furious at her for not being able to hold her tongue and getting him into this mess, and it broke Aurora’s heart. Gasping for breath against oncoming assault of tears, she stuttered again: “I just wanted...for you...for you both...I just...”

“Fledgling mine”, he said, softly. “Can you do something for me?”

She wanted to tell him that he would perhaps be better off without her trying to do things for him, or being anywhere around him at all, considering how well he was faring with her around, but knowing she couldn’t possibly be able to finish the sentence, she just nodded.

“Can you hold me?”

She fell down to her knees and threw her arms around his trembling bony shoulders with eagerness she hoped he was feeling; hoped it would show him that he was loved, very much so, even if not _everybody_ had the emotional capabilities of showing that. But Maleficent showed to Aurora that she loved her- showed it openly- why wouldn’t she show that to Diaval, too? What was the difference? Why was she like that to someone who hadn’t deserved it in the least?

It was when a silent “Ow” escaped him that Aurora remembered his ribs and the strength of her hug, which was, according to her godmother, comparable to that of a ram troll. 

“Sorry”, she squeaked out, but when she tried to loosen her grip, Diaval’s arms around her shoulders held tighter, and he pleaded, hoarsely: “Just a little longer? Please?”

“Took the words from me.” Oh, she was ready to hold him until dawn, if necessary. 

She inhaled the scent of feathers, dust, musk and earth, as numerous times before when they hugged. Which they did, dozens of times since he was enabled to have arms in her presence, and even before that, in his bird form, his wings over her shoulders, throughout her childhood. It was a known feeling, a feeling of being secure and protected, first with wings and later with arms; she could fall asleep instantly in those arms, just like she’d fall asleep under his wings when she was a child. Her aunties weren’t much of the hugging type, and Maleficent was even less so, but Diaval was, and so was Aurora, and if she was now given the opportunity to finally be the one whose arms comfort and protect, rather than the one who seeks comfort and protection, she wasn’t going to waste it. 

She remembered the first time they have hugged with him being in his human form. More accurately, when Aurora threw herself enthusiastically on him, and was surprised when she was, after a moment, rewarded with a healthy, strong embrace in return, rather than the perfunctory, unenthusiastic ones she would receive from her aunties. She had thought, back then, that the tears in his eyes were because she had hugged him too tight, as touch-starved as she was, now that she was finally allowed to express her affection as her nature demanded. But today, after Maleficent’s reaction, she knew those had been no tears of pain. Maleficent had teased him, then, for being childish. Well, Aurora was glad to have someone childish to share hugs with. If that made them childish, so be it.

“She _said_ that!”, Aurora wept in Diaval’s shoulder. “I heard her; I swear! Don’t you remember? She called you ‘my dear friend, my love’...”

“I don’t remember anything after you fell”, Diaval admitted, voice muffled. “But I believe you.”

“She repeated it!”

“I know. I know.”

“She does love you! She said that! I know what I...”

“I know she does. Shhhh, calm down now. I know she does. She just doesn’t like to be reminded of it.”

“I love you. You know that, right? I love you. And I’ll say that anywhere! To everybody!” 

Diaval kissed the top of her head. The tremors were raking his body; with his broken ribs, it had to be painful. “I love you, too, fledgling mine.” 

They went silent after that but neither was letting go. Finally, when Diaval’s weight seemed to lean unstably sideways in her arms, Aurora realized that he needed to lie back down. Heavy-hearted, she helped him settle back in the nest and pulled the covers back over him where they had slipped aside. She wiped away the beads of sweat which had mistied his forehead and hurried up to offer him a cup of blackberry juice which Maleficent had left at his bedside earlier. She held the cup for him as he drank because she suspected the juice would end up all over the nest instead of in his stomach if he’d try to hold it himself, and he didn’t even try to complain this time. Either he had learned his lesson, or he was simply less ashamed to show weakness when Maleficent was not around. Or- a terrifying thought occurred to her- less frightened.

“Diaval…you’re….you’re not afraid of her, are you?”

“What? No!” he looked at her with honest surprise. “Of course not! I used to be, yes, but…not in a very long time now.”

That was a relief. “But you let her be so unjust to you sometimes! Why?”

“I’m her servant, Aurora. It’s her prerogative to be able to get away with things I wouldn’t allow to anybody else.

Aurora scrutinized him with disbelief. “That’s not all there is.”

“Well, no. Do you want to know a secret?”, he whispered secretively. “I can get away with things she wouldn’t allow to anybody else, too.”

She smiled. “Oh, I noticed that. What I meant is….you’re not only a servant and a mistress, are you?”

Diaval closed his eyes. “Would it be too suspicious if I conveniently lose consciousness now?”

“Maybe just a little.”

He sighed. “I can’t speak of those things without her permission. Not because she’s my mistress, but because it wouldn’t be right. Please, understand that.” He gave her a wide, apologetic look. “I can only tell you that it’s…complicated.”

She nodded, smiling, a bit sadly. “And you’ve just given me the answer.”

“Oh, no.” he smiled back, “I most certainly did not, if anyone asks.”

Overcame by the urge to hug him once more, but not wanting him to have to sit up again, she leaned down and laid her head carefully on his right shoulder, arms wrapping gently around what was available of his upper body to hold onto. He chuckled when her hair fell over his face and tickled his nose, and he hugged her back with his good arm.

“She says she never hugs”, said Aurora ruefully, face buried in the blanket in which he was wrapped.

Diaval seemed to think carefully before he answered: “She doesn’t. Not like this.”

Aurora perked up. “But she does, somehow? How?”

“It’s complicated”, he repeated carefully. “But like this, simply because she’s happy to be with someone…no, that she doesn’t.” 

“Oh.” Aurora thought for a moment. “When she pets you in your bird form, is that like hugging to you?”

“I’m very lucky to have you, fledgling. If not for you, I would never know how amazing it is to hug.” He blew away the golden strands of hair falling over his mouth. “Or to be hugged.”

Aurora decided she didn’t have the heart to point out that he had avoided the answer. If his intention was to have her heart melted and make her stop asking questions, he had succeeded. “You know, when I went to the castle, I thought my father and my mother would hug me.”

Diaval’s grip on her tightened.

“But my mother was dead. And that man...”

“I’m so sorry, my little one”, Diaval murmured in her hair. 

“He didn’t want to hug me. But I don’t think I missed much for that. I don’t think I missed anything.” Her voice was firm. “He wasn’t my true father. Just my birthfather.”

“I’m so sorry…”

“I like my birdfather much better. And he gives me all the hugs that I need.”

The stunned look on Diaval’s face, followed by the widest grins she had ever seen on him, was worth everything; even the argument with her godmother. It filled her with warmth, like sitting next to a crackling fire after spending a day out on a freezing chill. 

“Birdfather”, he repeated, a definite note of pride in his voice, hoarse with emotion. Even his broken chest seemed to puff up. “I like the sound of that.”

oOo

It was well past sunset by the time Aurora’s horse trotted her way back to the castle, her rider feeling most unenthusiastic about the return. The only thing Aurora was looking forward to was talking to Phillip again. He had something in common with Diaval, she noted; they both seemed to understand just what to say, and what, and when just to let her speak her mind to ease her soul. They both had a way of making their presence important without being loud and dominant. 

Oh, and her aunties were there, too. They were very eager to stay with Aurora in the castle, at least until Aurora settles in her new role, and while she was still a bit sour at them because they kind of lied to her during her entire life, the young queen was incredibly glad for them being there for her now. Their presence made her feel a little less out of place, even as she was still adapting to their true forms and had to be careful not to sit at one of them as they buzzed around her throughout the day. While she felt so much more understood and even more cherished by Maleficent and Diaval than she did by the three pixies, she knew that they loved her nonetheless, and she did love them dearly. 

And of course, Burr, the pigeon who unwittingly started the whole mess. He fluttered around them the whole way, following Aurora, and finally settled on the pommel of her saddle when the darkness became too thick. Aurora caressed his sleek white back. A living, breathing bit of her home to follow her into her new life.

And yet, she couldn’t shake off the feeling of unease, regret even, every time Maleficent’s silent form glided above her, escorting her safely from the Moors to her new home. 

They haven’t argued on their way, but they didn’t talk much either, and the tension was so thick, it was suffocating. Aurora really, really didn’t want them to part on those terms, even if only for the night. Guilt had begun to gnaw at her the moment she had seen the tense, guarded expression on the fairy’s face as they faced one another when Aurora had finally climbed down the tree. The gnawing had turned into eating and devouring by the time they approached the castle.

Hadn’t she overstepped the line a little bit? Did she have the right to judge Maleficent so harshly? Hadn’t she poked her nose where she shouldn’t have, when she started digging on her relationship with Diaval? Maleficent did have the right not to talk about such private things, didn’t she? And denying the truth wasn’t, perhaps, the most mature way of trying to close the matter, but then again, Aurora’s pressing on the subject when the fairy clearly didn’t want to talk about it wasn’t very thoughtful, either. And besides, Maleficent was just going through turbulent, demanding time- they all did, Aurora did as well- but if Maleficent didn’t want to deal with even more changes, even more confessions of true feelings, on top of everything that was already going on, wasn’t it within her rights not to? And Aurora all but pushed her into a corner, confronted her with her own words which were spoken in a moment of fear for Diaval’s life, and weren’t meant for anybody to hear them.

Wasn’t it understandable that Maleficent felt….threatened? Violated even, maybe?

 _I made a mistake. Maybe a big one_.

It was a hard thing to swallow. 

Maleficent landed soundlessly on the ground when they came so close to the castle that its dark walls seemed to threaten to collapse on them. The guards were on the parapets; Aurora heard them yelling to open the gates, and the gates did open, slowly. Aurora dismounted her mare, her heart beating faster and faster. If she wanted to set things right, she had to do something about it now. 

“Godmother!”

Maleficent’s face was as expressionless as it usually was. Only her eyes gleamed in the darkness, widening so slightly. 

“I’m sorry”, Aurora rubbed her palms together nervously. “I shouldn’t….what I said. I didn’t…”

Maleficent gave her that little smile of hers, so small that it would go unnoticed on the face of any other, but it changed her entire expression. There was a hint of something that resembled relief, and a little of something that could have been sadness, when she answered: “Me neither.” 

Aurora’s smile was far more obvious. She grinned so hard that her mouth hurt. “You know, if you weren’t so opposed to it, I could hug you just now.”

Maleficent took a single heartbeat before her wings spread just a little bit; the hands gripping the staff now falling to her sides. “If you weren’t such a nosy little beastie, I might just take you up for that.”

Aurora strode towards her, not too fast to give her the opportunity to move away if she wishes to. But she didn’t. Not even when Aurora’s arms went gently around her shoulders, careful not to bump, press or squeeze her wings. At first, Aurora had every impression of hugging a waxen statue, for all the enthusiasm Maleficent seemed to be filled with, but then the fairy’s slender hands gently embraced Aurora’s shoulders, pulled her closer, and tighter, and tighter even, and those majestic wings unfurled to embrace them both. Maleficent let out an audible breath which might have been the quietest, most repressed sob that Aurora had ever heard. 

_Is this how a mother’s embrace is like?, Aurora wondered. Is this how my birth mother held me? What would have been if Diaval had managed to convince Maleficent to hold me sooner, years sooner? Would I call her ‘mother’? Would she be glad or offended if I did that now? Why does she tremble like this at this simple touch?_

It lasted only for a moment, but when they pulled away, Maleficent’s eyes were alight, and her smile took away ten years from her face. One of her hands was still on Aurora’s shoulder, and the girl felt like every bit of a fledgling that Diaval occasionally called her; a fledgling protected and beloved by the fiercest bird of prey in existence. Such a good, secure feeling. 

“I have been watching you in the Moors today” the fairy said. “You have an exceptional way with the fair folk. They respect you as if you are one of us.”  
That was, in Aurora’s opinion, the greatest compliment she had ever received, and she giggled like a little girl with glee.

“And as far as I can see, the humans are quite taken with you as well.” Maleficent eyed the parapets on which the fires were burning. Orange shadows danced across her face. “I was a very bad ruler, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, don’t say that! You are...”

“...the protector of the Moors. I will always be the protector of the Moors. That I am good at, if I do say so myself. But protecting and ruling are not the same thing. Ruling requires a modicum of...social skills, which I am sadly lacking. Diaval jested that I was ‘the mistress of all evil’. The cheeky bird. But he was right.”

Something told Aurora that what Maleficent was hinting at was going to be important, so she said nothing. She waited for the fairy to find the right words. Her heart was picking up speed fast.

“But you have it.”

“What?” 

“You have everything that it takes to reconcile the humans and the fair folk. You have everything that it takes to show them that peaceful coexistence is possible.” the look she gave Aurora was unfathomable. “You have everything to rule them both.”

“What?” Aurora could only repeat.

“Queen Aurora”, Maleficent smiled, even if her smile had something bittersweet in it, “I hereby abdicate from my position of the ruler of the Moors, and I ask you to take that burden from me.”

“What?” Aurora’s vocabulary seemed to have reduced to that one word. She was rather certain that was not how a queen of two kingdoms should sound.

“Will you be the Queen of the Moors?”

Aurora couldn’t find the words for a few moments. Her mouth hung open, but no words came out. She felt as if the time itself had stopped, frozen. 

“Two conditions”, she heard herself speaking at last. “The Wall of thorn goes down. And you hug me more often.” 

Maleficent squinted at her. “That clingy bird has a very worrisome influence on you.”

But she obliged nonetheless.


	14. Payback

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Diaval gets his payback for seventeen years of sweet torture.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Explicit stuff here. Be warned :)

He didn’t want to fall asleep.

He didn’t want to drift away after Maleficent and Aurora headed for the castle; in fact, he was so terrified of Maleficent’s return that he felt like he’d never be able to sleep again. Nervousness was burning a hole in his stomach; he felt like he had drank a mouthful of flammable acid, and now it burned, burned painfully. His heart was in his throat, and on top of everything, he needed to relieve himself.

So he waited in Maleficent’s nest, fearing her return and wishing it badly, curling himself into the blankets, feeling suddenly chilled to the bone. His teeth clattered. His hands were freezing cold, despite the heating spell Maleficent had cast at their home to keep him warm. His legs and back ached, and he guessed it was the result of several days spent lying down. 

At some point in his waiting, red dogs started to prowl around him. 

Their eyes were plucked out (did he do that?), but they had no problem seeing him with their empty, bloodied sockets. They circled around him, snarling; their furs were wet with blood. And no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t lift his wings. He opened his beak to yell at them to go away, but no words came out; only the frantic alarm calls of his original form. And was that a net weighing him down? Again? Just how many nets did the humans have at their disposal? 

‘ _They see you for what you are_ ’, Maleficent’s voice came from the behind. ‘ _Just a bird. A pathetic one, to that. Look at the state of you. You can’t even empty your bladder without help.’_

Why did she have to remind him of that? He squeezed his internal muscles, hoping to avoid dying in his own waste. The dogs circled around and around, and he wondered if he would be able to rip the nose of at least one, when they jump at him.

 _‘I should let them tear you apart’,_ Maleficent said, walking into his field of vision. _‘I have my own wings back. What on Earth would I need yours for now?’_

Her words chilled him much worse than a pack on eyeless dogs snarling at him; worse than a net that held him to the ground. He tried to cry ‘mistress!’ but only a croak came out. 

She spread her wings, magnificent, powerful. Even as a bird, his eyes welled up. Of course she wouldn’t need him. Where was Aurora? Ah, yes, she had became a Queen of Perceforest and hadn’t spoken with him in years. Years? Had if been that long? Why couldn’t he remember anything? Wasn’t it only…hours?

Maleficent thudded her staff against the ground, and all of the sudden, water started to emerge from the ground. It gushed out of the soil in streams and rivulets, everywhere he could see. And the net was holding him close to the ground. The dogs had disappeared. The water was rising. He was going to drown. Strangely, he wasn’t even scared anymore. What was there to lose? At least he could safely pee in the water without anybody noticing. And Maleficent was…

…cleaning him? 

He knew the different touches of her magic- transforming, healing, assaulting, soothing- and this one she had used on him many times, right here in this nest, after what he secretively called ‘ _lovemaking_ ’ and Maleficent referred to as ‘ _intercourse_ ’, if she addressed it at all. She would clean them both afterwards, in a lazy motion of her hand, and it was this exact kind of magical touch. But why would she clean him now? Was she drying him from all the water?

Where was all the water? Where were the dogs?   
His wings…where were his wings? Was he a man? Or a dog? Where was he, and what was he?

The nest. He had almost forgotten. He was in his mistress’ nest. 

_It was a dream, you idiot,_ his inner Maleficent informed him. _You fell asleep. In her nest._

His heart started beating fast, because everything that had happened previous days started coming back to him in a heap of jumbled up images, sounds and sensations, and while his anxious mind tried to put the pieces together into a coherent image, one thought stood out _: I fell asleep in her nest. As a man_.

She had never, ever allowed him to sleep next to her as a man. As a bird, sometimes- if one of them was having a nightmare, sometimes after lovemak…intercourse, but never, ever as a man. Most nights he slept in his nest right above hers, in his true form.

She was going to be furious. She’ll see that as a violation of trust. She’ll…

“Diaval? Are you awake?” her voice was high- pitched, tense. His initial plan was to pretend to be still asleep, in hopes she’ll turn him into a bird or even a dog or whatever she sees fit, so he won’t have to explain himself, but the scent of her feathers- oh, goodness, her feathers, her _wings_ \- engulfed him it its warm, dusty sweetness, and he knew she was so close he could touch her if he’d only raise a hand, and despite himself, he had to peek at her to see her at least a little bit. What he saw were her emerald eyes staring intently at him from above, and a canopy of dark feathers over them both. He took in her scent and it seemed to make his blood run faster. 

“Mistress”, he tried to speak through dry, cracked lips, and it came out rough and raspy and low, “I…had a bad dream…” He licked his lips and tasted blood. “A very bad dream…”

Her finger came to his lips as if silencing him, and he obeyed. He thought she wanted to shut him up out of anger, but then another familiar magical sensation ran over his lips, and he realized she wasn’t silencing him at all. She was _healing_ him. Healing his cracked, bleeding lips. 

He felt very silly and rather guilty. He should have known better.

“It is over now”, she answered quietly. Her hand went from his lips to his forehead. “I think you have a fever. I’ll make you some willow bark tea.”

Fever? Maybe. Perhaps that was why he felt so cold, and his skin uncomfortable, as if stretched too tight over his body? “Apologies, mistress. I didn’t mean to fall asleep here”, his voice was barely above whisper. He was still unsure if she truly didn’t mind him slumbering in her sacred place of rest, or if she was choosing not to show it.

“Don’t be ridiculous”, she said sternly. “Where else would you sleep now? If today taught us anything, it’s that you are not well enough to be a bird yet. And now you are running a fever. No more changing forms for at least a week.”

“Hrmph.” He racked his brain, trying to figure out why did he have a feeling that something was different now then how it was when he had fallen asleep. He remembered…waiting for her, because he was anxious about her fight with Aurora, and because he needed to…

The realization hit him like a slap to the face. 

Oh, no. Oh no, no, _no_.

His bladder had been full when he had fallen asleep, but it felt empty now. And she had just used a cleaning spell on him. 

He looked at her with utter terror, his eyes darting from her unreadable face to the nest on which he had been lying. Frantically, he started tugging at his covers, trying to untangle himself from the blankets to assess the damage, even if he knew that his mistress had likely cleaned him dry. For some reason, he wished she had left him to lie in his filth, so he can clean that up himself, even if it took him the whole day; even if he fainted twenty times while doing it; even if he had to drag himself around with one good hand until he’s done. He’d prefer have all his bones rebroken rather than his mistress having witnessed him in that state, let alone cleaning him up like a hatchling. 

“What are you doing?” Maleficent asked, taking him by the hands to stop his frantic squirming. “Stop that!”

“Did I…” he stuttered, torn between clinging to blissful ignorance and facing the merciless certainty. He couldn’t even say it out loud. “Did you just…did you just have to…did I…mess up your nest?” 

Maleficent’s lips parted to speak, but she was still silent. Only her grip on his hands tightened. It was all the answer he needed. He tried to formulate an apology, an explanation, an excuse, anything, but his eyes, which were already hurting from fever, were now burning with shameful tears. Mortified, he turned his head away and tried to roll away on the other side, but Maleficent’s grip on him was making that difficult. Why was she not angry? She ought to want to tear him apart for such desecration. 

“It does not matter, Diaval”, she said at last. Her voice was hoarse. “Do you hear me? Do you understand me? Understand me, you silly bird. Look at me.”

Look at her? He’d rather face a crater of hell. It wasn’t about the mess itself; a raven that he was, he never understood the human concept of considering body functions disgusting or undesirable. It was about the lack of control, the helplessness, being reduced to that pitiful state, and worse of all, his mistress witnessing that.

“Look at me”, she insisted, firmly. Her grip on his hands was so tight, it was almost painful. 

“Y’Should’ve left me like that”, he squeezed out through gritted teeth. His breathing was deep and ragged and it hurt his ribs and his eyes burned and his head throbbed. He was fighting not to cry and not to vomit. “’m sorry…”

“Enough with self-pity”, she said harshly. There was the subtlest tremor to her voice; an alarmed timber which he didn’t know how to interpret. Had he been in a better state, he’d deliver something along the lines of ‘ _oh, look who’s talking now’_ , but he wasn’t, and he wouldn’t. “Diaval, it is not your fault. It is mine. You are wounded and feverish and I should have remembered to take care of your needs before I left. It is I who is sorry.”

He shook his head, triggering a bout of headache. Strangely, but he would have preferred if she would be angry with him. He knew her anger. He knew how to deal with it. But he didn’t know how to deal with this. It left him confused and even more embarrassed. 

One of her hands released his own and touched his face. His skin there was growing a coarse stubble; he ought to ask her to help him get rid of it. But at this moment, he couldn’t ask anything of her. He couldn’t say anything, because he was too stunned by the way her touch on his face was both soft yet demanding, unwavering. Still he wouldn’t turn to look at her, stubbornly rigid. 

Her sharp nails caressed his jawline, then followed the trail of the scars on his temple. Finally, he felt his hair being smoothed back. Normally, he’d melt into her touch, particularly since such tender caresses did not happen often outside their intercourse sessions, but now he only wanted to be left alone, hidden, invisible. He would never have thought there might be a time he would not adore her touch, but now he shied away from it, and still felt terrible.

“I said I was sorry!” her voice took on a higher pitch than usual; there was something urgent in it, alarmed. “What do you want me to say? Don’t.. don’t be such an arse! At least do me the curtesy of looking at me while you are angry at me!”

That got his attention. “What?”, he frowned, finally turning his head to glance at her, despite the tears his eyes were brimming with. “’m not angry at _you_!” 

Maleficent’s face was as stone-hard as ever; only her eyes were wider and wilder than normal. He saw her swallowing, hard.

“I’m angry at myself!” he hissed. “I don’t want you to see me like this! Is that so difficult to understand?”

He rarely ever snapped at her, even when she was to blame for his troubles. But he did now, when she was entirely guiltless and he should be thanking her on his bended knee that she wasn’t kicking him out of her home for all the trouble he was causing her. It made him even more disgusted at himself. 

“Do you remember what I was like when we first met?”

He wasn’t expecting that. The question disrupted his self-pitying stream of thoughts, making him look at her again to make sure he hadn’t mishear her. She was taking deliberately slow breaths, and he knew that it must have been a colossal effort, forcing herself to speak of it. She never had before.

“Do you remember my wounds? My helplessness? My pain? Do you remember me having to strip down for you to dress my wounds?”

Of course he remembered. Even in his current confused state of mind, his fragmented memory refusing to put the recent events together in a sensible picture, he did remember. 

“You were a stranger then”, she continued quietly.   
He was. And it was only now that he could begin to comprehend how humiliated, how desperate, how unworthy of existence she must have felt, being reduced to ask for the help from a stranger. She hadn’t call it ‘help’ at the time, of course- it was an order for him, a task- but even back then, he had been able to see it for what it truly had been. 

“Am I a stranger to you now?”

“No”, he replied softly, “but I wish…”

She eyed him skeptically. “No, you would not. Ridiculous creature, you.” Her hand came to rest on his forehead again, and this time, he didn’t shy away. He closed his eyes, inhaling the intoxicating scent of her feathers. “You did not care for me at the time, but you did your best to aid me through that horror, and you managed that without ever making me feel more helpless or more humiliated that I had already felt. Well…” he saw her swallowing again, “... I ask of you to allow me return the favor. I understand how humiliating the road to recovery can be. I will never look down at you for it, I swear. I could never think any less of you for needing help now; in fact, I…my…my respect for you is…has never been greater. Because of everything you have done. For me. For Aurora. You fool.”

A speech this long was very much out of character for her, even if she sounded like every word was hurting her throat while she was forcing them to come out. Diaval found himself tearing up again, and warmth blossomed in his chest, so intense that it was almost painful. She leaned over him, spreading her wings as if to shelter him, and in the protective darkness of her body and the warm thickness of her scent, he allowed himself to accept that after seventeen years of her needing him, he was the one in need now. 

And it was all right. 

oOo

He must have started to dose off again, because he was stirred awake by the touch of her magic again.  
Like she had done numerous times in these several days, she was letting her healing magic through his entire body to speed up the taxing and normally months-long process of growing the broken edges of his bones back together. And each time, his pain would be a little less sharp. His head was no longer killing him, his left arm was good enough for limited use, his tailbone was well enough he could sit almost comfortably, and even his ribs, which for some reason hurt the most, no longer restricted his breathing with the searing pain during every breath he would take. His smaller cuts were all gone; the smaller bruises were disappearing, and only the huge one on his left chest remained. If only he could shake off that stubborn weakness, the lightheadedness that just wouldn’t let go of him, the sleepiness that made his mind slow and foggy…

 _Aurora_. 

The thought came so suddenly, dissolving instantly the drowsiness which was once again overwhelming him, that his eyes bolted wide open, and he audibly sucked in a pained breath of air. He stirred, hissed, leaned on his right arm trying to sit up.

“What?” Maleficent’s voice raised in alarm. “Diaval, what is it? What is wrong?”

“Aurora!” he now remembered, remembered that she was supposed to return to the castle, alone for the first time in her life away from Maleficent’s and Diaval’s watch…and that Maleficent had escorted her…and that his two headstrong ladies had an argument before leaving. 

_You told him that you loved him…_

_I said nothing._

Oh, owl’s droppings. Perhaps he would be better off with that fog still clouding his mind. Clarity was suddenly frightening.   


_I like my birdfather better_. 

And heartwarming.

“Aurora is all right,” Maleficent said with an impatient edge to her voice, placing both her hands on his naked shoulders to prevent him from his foolhardy intention of sitting up straight. Not that she had to fight him much. The moment he lifted his head from the softness of her nest, merciless pounding took place in his forehead, and his surroundings became somewhat…hazy. “I left her in that accursed place, full of weapons and soldiers, for the first time in human world, with those three quarter- brained talking dungflies and a pigeon for defense and communication. Of course she is all right. Why would she not be? All is well and lovely.”

Diaval’s heart clenched at the sarcasm that dripped from her words. She used it not to hurt him, but to bleed out some of her own hurt and anguish, only marginally aware that she was likely to scorch others as she did so. Diaval had long ago grown immune to that venomous bite, though, and rather than feeling hurt himself, he felt upset for her troubled soul. His own panic had to wait. If he was succumb to his own anxiety concerning their daughter, she would have nobody to reign in her doubts and soothe her fears, and that would not do at all. He would have time to be doubtful and scared later, when it won’t affect her. Now, she needed him to be calm. It was the only thing he could be useful with at the moment anyway. If only he could be a bit stronger, heal a bit faster, it would have been him on Aurora’s shoulder instead of that vain pigeon, following her to that place of gloom and doom, and Maleficent would be much more at ease with Aurora being there. As it was, unfortunately, he was nothing but an additional burden on her shoulders.

At least she didn’t seem to ponder on the argument which she and Aurora had. Diaval didn’t dare to ask if they have made up. It would raise the question on why they argued in the first place, and he wasn’t ready to go down that road, or make his mistress go down it either.

“She will be all right, mistress”, he tried to use his most soothing voice; an experienced tone, well honed over the years. “I have all faith in that pigeon to arrive here momentarily to alarm us should something go awry. And her aunties, for all their self-centeredness and silliness, do care for her. On top of it all, she has the utmost respect of commander John, if I’m any judge of character. The castlemaids adore her. They all adore the queen who had a dragon under her little finger.” He smiled, and while Maleficent didn’t exactly smile back, her shoulders did lose some of their rigidness, and her wings seemed to relax a bit.

He contemplated mentioning that Phillip is there as well to aid the young queen, but decided it would be wise not to. Maleficent all but detested the poor boy, and Diaval could guess why. He, too, was a bit concerned about the obvious attraction between the two, and he feared that it might lead to some reckless acts which they both might regret later, Aurora in particular. But despite his fears, the boy had left him a very good impression of someone much more mature than his years; as if his growing up hadn’t been all that rosy, despite all the wealth. And Diaval trusted Aurora to be clever enough not to do anything…rash.

Of course, she would need to know something of those rash things, in order to know what not to do. And how much did she know? That was one thing Diaval hadn’t talked about with her, and he didn’t know if Maleficent did either. And what of her aunties? Had anybody ever told the girl how exactly mating worked, and what it meant? If she gets herself in a…tempting situation, will she know what is she doing, should she decide to do it?

 _Argh_. He shouldn’t have thought of it now. He wondered if he should ask Maleficent about it, and decided against it. It would only aggravate her anxiety. Nothing could be done about it now; besides, he couldn’t imagine Aurora, despite all her naïveté, to blindly jump into something so alien to her, the very first day she is left to her own devices. She was much smarter than that. He’ll carefully bring that up tomorrow to his mistress, when they both hopefully gotten some rest. 

Will they get any rest tonight, though? Maleficent was still kneeling next to him, looking at him, or through him- he wasn’t certain. Her angular features were even sharper now, the dim light casting deep shadows over her gaunt face. She was tense like a strung bow, and while the concern for Aurora’s well being was certainly the main reason, along with the effort of the past several days, Diaval knew that the last evening’s argument didn’t help either. That topic constantly buzzed around his mind, like an angry hornet, never leaving him at peace for long.

Should he bring that up, try to talk about it? He shuddered at the thought, especially after the emotional moment they have just had, before he almost fell asleep again. If she was that harsh with Aurora, she would be trice that harsh with him, and while he normally prided himself with his thick, Maleficent-proof skin, he didn’t think he had it in him now, weakened as he was, to butt heads with her. What for, anyway? She was crystal-clear about the fact that she obviously regretted her slip of the tongue, and he was grateful that he hadn’t remembered it. He had foolishly allowed his heart a leap of joy when Aurora had revealed that she had heard Maleficent’s reckless proclamation of…care. It hurt when Maleficent denied it; it hurt more that a little, and thankfully Aurora had been there to hold him together so he wouldn’t crumble into irreparable pieces. How broken would he be if he had witnessed it with his own ears, only to have that little bit of joy crushed under her icy tone and indifferent words? 

He had told Aurora the truth. He did know that his mistress cared for him, in her own way. There was no doubt in his heart of that. But it would mean a world to him if she wouldn’t choose to hide that fact like a shameful secret. 

So, why ask, when he had his answer already? 

“Tea” Maleficent whispered to herself, stirring from her troubled thoughts. She got to her light feet, and when she stood, her wingtip brushed over Diaval’s bare arm. It was enough to make him shiver, feeling tingly from the smallest feather on his head to the tip of his clumsy toe. To say that hers were the most magnificent wings he had ever seen would be an understatement; to say that he was in absolute love-struck awe before them would be even more so. Four or five days went by since she had gotten them back (or was it six? He had lost count), but he still hadn’t dared to reach out and touch them. 

Eventually, the thought wryly, he would have to take her up for her words and preen them. The thought made what little blood he had left in his body rushed into his nether regions, leaving his head blissfully foggy. 

Which was likely why he said: “They are still a mess” before his brain had the opportunity to intervene. 

Maleficent turned around to face him- she had her back to him, preparing his medicinal tea on her small hearth in which magical fire burned. It heated the hearth, but didn’t burn the tree which made their home. Her eyes twinkled. 

“I am going to believe it is the fever talking”, she replied, stirring what Diaval knew to be a bitter infusion. Hmpf. Now that he had already put his foot in his mouth, he had hoped to coax her into mentioning him preening her again, as she did back that night when the curse was broken, her wings returned and Stefan died, but apparently she had said many things that night she wasn’t keen to repeat. He needed a different approach.  


“Perhaps the blood loss is to blame. I am hardly responsible for what comes out of my mouth.”

“We better make sure that something sensible comes in, then.” She presented two cups to him; one filled with a familiar yellowish concoction which he knew to be bitter as bile, and an unfamiliar one whose dark greyish, murky color looked even less promising. 

“What on blue skies is that?” he sniffed the dark grey liquid with a marked lack of enthusiasm. “Ugh, smells like moldy bread!”

“It is an infusion of mold”, Maleficent answered flatly. “Drink up.”

Diaval looked at her, cross-eyed. “I’m sorry…I thought I was the one who hit his head.”

“This is no joking matter. You bones might have knitted back together, but your general condition is not improving as I hoped it would. I am doing everything in my power to help you, and I would appreciate if you would not fight me every step of the way.”

“Why mold?” Diaval felt almost like crying. The mere sight of a smelly liquid made him want to gag. Why wouldn’t she just leave him to sleep, eat and repeat until he’s either recovered or dead, like birds were supposed to? “What is that supposed to do? It makes things rot, not heal!”

“Yes, and it also kills the inflammation which might have set in you, if the fever is any indication. That is very much the point.”

“Is that some theory of yours, or do you have some actual experience in this?”

“Are you questioning my knowledge?” her eyes became dangerously narrow slits, and he groaned in desperation. She had just given him his answer.

“You don’t even know if I have that…inflammation! You are only guessing! I might be drinking that monstrosity for nothing!”

Maleficent continued glaring at him as she waved her hand, and a large basked floated through the entrance. From it, a wonderful scent emerged. It hovered in mid-air before Maleficent, and Diaval stretched his neck, trying to see what she was going to take out of it. He didn’t wait for long. The basket, it turned out, contained a clay pot, and inside was the most beautiful sight Diaval had seen in days, not counting Maleficent’s wings, of course. Roasted liver- sheep, he guessed- as well as heart and lungs, probably of the same poor beast. There was a kidney thrown in as well. But mostly liver. And Diaval _adored_ liver. Which he so rarely had the opportunity to get his talons on, save for the poor mice around the Moors to whom he was a well-feared wrath of doom. And the occasional rabbit or deer carrion. But the ferocity of the craving he had now felt at the sight and smell of roasted offal surprised even his most primal animal side. It was beyond simple hunger; it was nearly uncontrollable craving of a creature whose life depended on that very source of nourishment. His mouth watered so much it was embarrassing, but his hunger was so terrible he didn’t much care if he was embarrassed. His heart was skipping beats from excitement.

“Aurora’s provisions”, Maleficent said, looking at him intently. “But only if you be a good bird and drink your medicine.” 

He had to swallow before answering hoarsely: “ You are a cruel mistress.” It was supposed to be a teasing quip, but the base desire in his voice colored it with desperation. 

Maleficent didn’t seem to mind. In fact, she smiled victoriously. “What a brilliant observation.”

“I heard that before.”

“I haven’t heard your answer yet.”

He licked his lips, staring at the pot of still-steaming offal. It would have been perfect if it had been raw, but oh goodness, it was fine, more than fine, as it was. “Did you have some poor human taste it first, in case it’s poisoned, like you made that poor boy?” he jested.

“I did”, came the deadly serious reply. 

One look at her stone-hard features convinced Diaval she wasn’t joking. He wondered if he should ask who the unfortunate taster, but decided he’d rather not know which poor creature had been traumatized for life so his supper would be absolutely safe for him to eat. Under any other circumstances, he’d be exasperated, but now he was strangely moved. His peculiar, impossible, wonderful mistress and her weird acts of care. Blink and you might miss them for what they truly were. 

“And if I don’t drink those hellish concoctions of yours, you’d deprive me of the meal that our dear, poor girl prepared with such care and love?”

“Not only that”, she rebuffed easily his weak attempt of emotional blackmail; “I’d enlist that polite, obedient pigeon to preen my wings instead of you.”

Diaval’s jaw dropped with consternation. “You would not!”

Her eyes narrowed, challenging him to dare her.

Knowing he’s been beat, Diaval chose to be done with the mold infusion first. As he sipped the horrible tasting brew, whose taste couldn’t be hidden even with a copious amount of honey, Diaval still celebrated internally. He found a way to make her promise him to let him preen her after all. It was worth a thousand unpalatable concoctions.   
And besides, he had his more immediate prize now. 

His whole body was trembling when he reached for the pot full of food, which Maleficent turned her nose up to, even as she helped him to sit up comfortably. 

“Dou you need a spoon or a for…no, I supposed you do not”, she said matter-of-factly, watching with mixture of astonishment, sorrow and fascination as Diaval took the largest piece of liver with his fingers and devoured it with ravenousness which would put any wolf to shame. He forced himself to slow down, to chew at least for a moment or two, and barely found the strength for that little bit of self-control. He had never, ever in his life tasted anything so heavenly good, and he wasn’t even aware up to this point just how unsatisfactory was his diet of fruits, nuts and mushrooms during there past few days, since he was injured. Maleficent had refused to take anything from the castle other than water, despite Aurora’s repetitive pleas, and the only things they both ate were those which either the fairy or Aurora were able to forage in the vicinity of their shelter. And he didn’t want to be even more of a burden, asking for meat he had craved. Ravens were omnivores, and he could do with what his mistress had managed to provide in such difficult situation. He _thought_ he could do with it. 

“Breathe a little”, Maleficent warned him, watching him with the expression which he guessed was either disgust or concern that he’d choke to death, now that she had put do much effort into patching him up together. He eyed her guiltily, but proceeded to devour his meal with determination of a post-hibernation bear. His head hurt and his body protested from sitting upright for so long, but it didn’t matter. Every fiber of his exhausted body was screaming for him to keep eating, that this was exactly what he needed to get his strength back, and he obeyed. The liver was cleaned up first, followed with the lungs, then with the heart. By the moment he finally accepted a cup of willow bark tea from Maleficent, feeling that his stomach was full even if his instincts told him to keep eating, curse it, because who knows when he’d get a chance again, only the kidney was left, and he eyed it ruefully over the rim of his cup as he sipped the bitter tea. 

“Leave it”, Maleficent said warningly, taking the cup from him. “Don’t make yourself sick now, you gluttonous creature. You’ll need breakfast tomorrow. I will make sure it doesn’t spoil.” 

He allowed her arms to gently lower him back on the soft nest. His head hurt, his back was killing him, his skin ached all over, but still he felt incredibly satisfied. Also, ashamed, yes, so ashamed for manifesting such lack of self-control, once _again_ , but there was nothing he could do about it now. He looked at his mistress apologetically, heat rising to his already flushed cheeks.

“Forgive me”, he said, now that he vaguely remembered that he had a pride. “I suppose that wasn’t a pretty sight. I don’t know what came over me.”

“I believe I have failed you”, Maleficent answered after a moment’s pause, quietly, as she put the rest of the food away, enchanting it so it would remain fresh until tomorrow morning. Diaval frowned, not certain he had heard her properly. 

“I consistently fail to recognize your needs, from the moment you got injured”, she said, looking purposefully away from him, wings tight against her back. “I botched up healing your injuries. I cannot get around your blood loss. I miscalculated your ability to withstand the change of form in this state. I didn’t ask you if you needed anything before I went to escort Aurora away. Obviously, I completely disregarded the fact that your nourishment needs might not be equal to mine. My dear bird, I’m afraid I lack your talent for being the nurturing one.”

She was as harsh towards herself as she was to everybody else, of course she would be, and Diaval wouldn’t have any of it, especially not on his account.

“Mistress, don’t”, he said earnestly. “You didn’t botch anything. You saved my life. Multiple times, in fact. If not for you, I would be a bird-shaped splatter on the ground, one way or another. Even as a dragon, I wouldn’t have survived without you. You are the best mistress a raven could have, and I wouldn’t change you for anybody or anything in the world.”

She was still not looking at him; still rigid like a stone. When she did spoke, it wasn’t what Diaval had expected: “Anything? Even…freedom?”

His horrible dream came back to him. Maleficent, telling him she no longer needs him. Telling him that he’s useless. The sheep innards he had consumed with such delight threatened to make reappearance. 

_Don’t fall prey to your own fears. Look at her. You know her better than that._

Maleficent turned to face him, slowly. Her chin was held high; jaw set tight, eyelids heavily obscuring the cold glint of her eyes. Her wings were tightly set against her ramrod-straight back. Anybody who didn’t know her would see haughtiness, coldness; cruelty, even. But Diaval did know her, and he saw right through that.

 _Fear_.

She had put on all of her armors. One doesn’t do that when they are indifferent. She was bracing for a devastating impact. 

_Fear. Because of me. Me._

_Oh my goodness. She thinks that I would…leave her? Has she been eating the wrong kind of mushrooms?_

Careful. He had to be careful. One careless move, and…

Still, he had nothing to offer but truth. He only needed to deliver it the right way.

“Freedom?” he repeated. “I have always had it. Never spent a day in my life not being exactly where I wanted to be.”

Her wings twitched; a surprised move that gave her away, while the rest of her remained frozen. 

“Always?”

“It has been seventeen years. Ravens don’t prosper that long in captivity.”

She eyed him clinically. “Yes, you do look absolutely prosperous right now.”

A pained grin escaped him. “Good point. But I stand my ground.”

“You do remember that you saved my life? Saved the life of the one my heart calls a daughter? That you are no longer bound by honor, or promise?”

“Do you honestly believe me to be so unimaginative that I wouldn’t be able to trick my way out by the end of our first year, had I wished it so?”

She squinted at him. The rigid curve of her shoulders lost the littlest bit of their tension. “You are even more of a vain fool then I was giving you credit for. Do you truly believe the words which are coming out of your mouth?”

He scratched his long nose. “I’m not certain what the right answer is now, but I’m going to opt for ‘yes’”. 

She turned to face him fully; turned slowly, while her wings eased, opened slightly, feathers fluffing. It was like watching a sunflower turning for the light and opening up, even if this particular sunflower was on a darker spectrum of colors. It was beautiful. 

And it was for him. 

He might have cried, if he hadn’t been afraid it would upset her. She always seemed to be nervous around his tears; he guessed they irritated her. And he didn’t want to irritate her now.

“Vain fool”, she repeated. The gleam in her eyes changed into something softer, twinklier. 

“May I ask”, he licked his lips before carefully continuing, “is my mistress agreeable with my choice?”

Her wings relaxed further; her feathers fluffed up, then set back again. There was a short, sharp intake of breath, but when she spoke, her voice was carefully controlled: “Surely you jest. Do you think I would enjoy training _another_ silly bird to be my eyes and ears? I still cannot be on two places at the same time, and it took seventeen years to make you into a decent help.”

“Oh, I don’t know”, he grinned. “I think I had you entirely satisfied some time during our seventh year together.”

Yes, she was fighting a smile. Golden glow was bathing her skin; as if her magic, the benevolent kind, seeped out, unable to be held back. “Ninth.”  


“Seventh. We were in each other’s company for seven years, one month and four days. Not that I counted.”

A rare kind of smile appeared on her face; the one which showed all her teeth, sharp fangs included, and it made her look ten years younger. She shined like a beacon in his eyes, and he couldn’t take his eyes off her. 

“If you insist”, she replied, with that mischievous, brilliant grin.

He recalled her fight with Aurora that evening, and decided it had truly been unnecessary. It was enough to look around- to see the nest she had granted him, to feel the warming spell she had cast to make him feel less chilled, to take in the cups of blood replenishing potion, mold infusion, willow bark tea- to see clearly what she did not want to say with words. It was enough for him to feel her healing magic in his bones, to remember that she fed him from her own hand and cleaned him with her own magic and comforted him with words of affection he knew she was uncomfortable to speak, to understand that love had more than one language, and hers was a particularly cryptic one. But he understood it well. 

Should he tell her that? Should he tell her that she needn’t worry, that what she was giving him was more than enough, that one unspoken word did not make the difference, that she shouldn’t feel pressured into saying something she wasn’t ready for, that he knew how she felt, even if she refused to say it, and that while he would be thrilled for her to announce their bond for the whole world to know, it was not an exclusive criteria for him to be content with what they had, whatever it was?

No, he decided. 

Not tonight. She had been purposefully avoided mentioning that argument, as if she wanted to will it into nonexistence by ignoring it. They have both done a lot of walking on eggshells tonight, and pushing for more would be pushing their luck. She was happy with what they had, and he was happy too, and it was enough. He just wanted to bask in her light now. 

“Drink up”, she told him. He did, shuddering at the bitterness. But it was worth it, seeing how his mistress was unable to hide that beautiful, toothy smile. Who would have thought that he’d consider a creature with that many teeth so alluring?

He wanted to hug her so much. He wanted to run his talons through that dark feathers, to straighten the ruffled barbs, to feel that silkiness under his fingertips, to be a bird again to run his beak through them and remove all the dirt and the mites and to see her face going blissful as he’s doing that. He wanted to caress her face, to touch her lips, as he had done many times before when they were here naked and heated and moaning, but she hadn’t allowed him to reach for his wings yet, and besides…

…besides, he wanted to kiss her lips too much, and that she had explicitly forbidden him the very first time she had bedded him, and never revoked that. And he wasn’t certain he had enough self-control at the moment.

So, he kept his hands for himself. 

“I think this works, you know”, he said, looking at his cup. “I do feel better.” His headache was almost gone, he no longer felt chilled to the bone, the cramps in his legs and back were gone, his skin no longer burned. He felt hot now, sweaty, and he kicked off most of his blankets away.

“Of course it works”, she took the empty cup from him. “Time to get some sleep while the fever is not troubling you. I will leave for the castle at first light, and I will wake you up as well. You will need to be prepared for spending several hours alone. A sentry will be positioned right in front of the tree, should you need anything urgently.”

Sadly, the smile was instantly wiped away from her face, and his shoulders sagged as well. They have both successfully forgotten for a short while that Aurora was in that wretched place, away from them. Unfortunately it couldn’t have lasted long.

“Do you need anything at the moment?”

“No.” he blushed again at the memory of his…accident. “No, I’m fine now.”

“Very well then.” 

“But…”

She squinted at him when he hesitated. “What?”

“Um…am I supposed to sleep…here?” he pointed at her nest in which he lay. 

“Didn’t we already have this conversation? You cannot be a bird yet. Yes, you will sleep right there where you are now.”

“But…” he bit on his lip anxiously, “…what about you, then?”

“What about me?” she continued squinting at him.

“Do you consider me so large that I could not fit into a nest this wide?” 

“Eh…” Diaval wanted to point out two things: first, that the nest was spacious enough for them both when she was wingless, but now, it was impossible for them to lie in it side by side unless she’d squeeze so tightly next to him that she’d all but wrap him in her wings. And second, that she had never allowed him to sleep next to her in his human form. Not overnight, not here.

“Impertinent creature”, she said, eyes twinkling. She had mischief on her mind, he could tell. “Budge over and let me teach you a lesson.”

He gave her as much space as he could, trying to shrink himself up on the very edge of the nest. She looked at him with disapproval. 

“What are you doing?”

“I’m…giving you space, mistress”, Diaval stuttered, trying to calm his suddenly palpitating heart. His breathing threatened to get out of control. Maleficent was lowering herself next to him, her wings tight against her body. 

“Why?”

He couldn’t find anything witty or clever to answer.

He could only stare at her, wide-eyed. _‘Because you were always unwilling to sleep next to me in my human form, which probably has something to do with the fact that the last man you fell asleep with had cut the parts of your body off’_ was what came to his mind, but it didn’t seem wise to say. 

“Any form you take”, she continued, lying carefully on her side, wings still tight at her back, her light gown opening up at the front to reveal one small breast, “a raven, a man, a dragon…you are always you. Are you not?”

Diaval finally found his words. “I am, mistress. Always me. And always yours.”

“Good”, she whispered, eyes still twinkling. But she was nervous; he saw her pulse throbbing in her neck, the way she cleared her throat, her dilated pupils.   
_I’ll eat a whole raw carrot if any of us gets any sleep tonight_ , he thought. 

“Would you prefer me to turn my back to you?” he asked, guessing she might be less uncomfortable if she wouldn’t have his human face staring at her while she was trying to sleep. She thought for a moment before saying: “Yes.”

He obeyed instantly, if a little painfully. It was his bad side he had to roll onto, but it wasn’t that bad anymore, and it was irrelevant. A small price to pay for her comfort. If there was a twinge of sorrow in his gut, he went to snuff it out at once. Of course she didn’t want to look at his face. She was going well over her way to make him comfortable, and the fact that she found the strength to endure what was undoubtedly great discomfort was yet another expression in her love language. The last thing he should feel is hurt that the sight of his human face next to her bothered her. 

The straw beneath him moved when he felt Maleficent’s body shifting. Her scent teased his senses; it became stronger, as if she was shifting towards him. And there was heat, suddenly, at his naked back. His heart started racing.

“Much easier to hold you like this”, her breath tickled the skin behind his ear, sending a shiver down his spine, then into his belly and between his legs at last. One thin arm ran over his side, embracing him. 

“Mistress…” he could barely speak; he feared his heart might jump out of his throat. Her breast was now against his back, and he could feel her heart beating fast as well. 

“Am I causing you pain?” she asked, and he was quick to shake his head no with determination. “No, mistress.”

“You know you don’t have to call me mistress anymore, don’t you?”

He smiled, covering her hand with his own. This was a nice position after all. His only regret was that they couldn’t see each other’s faces. “I never considered it an obligation in the first place.”

“Is that so, you insolent bird?” she pressed her lips at his earlobe, and he could hear from her tone she was smiling. “Nevertheless, you are no longer under the obligation which you apparently did not have.”

He had been feeling so weak since his injury that he couldn’t have imagined his male human parts would ever be able to work again, but obviously he had been wrong, because they were starting to gear up just fine. 

“But what if I want it?” he whispered, trying to tilt his head so he could at least glance at her. “What if I _love_ it?”

Her heart definitely picked up speed, fluttering against his back like a butterfly. 

“Then continue”, she breathed into his hair. “I love hearing it too.”

He was tempted, so very tempted to gently lead her hand lower, so she can feel the state of him, but two things stopped him. First, he couldn’t forget that only several hours ago he didn’t have the strength to hold up a spoon for long, that he wet himself in his sleep, that his broken bones still didn’t heal right, and the last thing he wanted was to lose consciousness while trying to please his mistress. He was feeling much better now, but he knew it was a temporary effect of a decent meal, three kinds of medicinal brews and Maleficent’s magic. He shouldn’t risk making a fool out of himself yet again.

Second, she needed her rest. He would have the time to sleep the whole day when the night is over, but she had things to do. Important things. Sleep was in order.

Then, he felt a brush of a familiar texture over his shoulder and chest. Smooth, silky, dry. Familiar scent. Something dark and beautiful entered his field of vision. 

It took him ten heartbeats to allow himself to realize it was, indeed, her wing. She had slowly spread her wing over him, covering almost his entire body in its heavenly touch. He didn’t dare to breathe, afraid he’d spook her, or that he’d wake up and see it was again a vivid dream again. Her own heart was beating, steady and strong, against his back, while his fingers interlaced with hers underneath the blanket of her feathers. 

He was trembling, he realized. He had felt the touch of her wings when he was a dragon, when she had curled herself up under his gigantic leathery wing, and he would have cried with joy, if dragons could cry. But his dragonscale hide didn’t possess the delicateness of his human fingertips, their dexterity which could trace and feel each and every barb, the sensitivity with which they explored the thin bone structure underneath the ruffled coverts, the otherworldly softness of the smallest downy feathers closest to the skin, when he slowly slid the fingers of his free hand over the magnificent wing, then gently buried them into the rich plumage in the way he knew from experience that was pleasant. 

Another expression in her love language. The touch of her feathers. Who needs words?

A raven such as him definitely not. Especially when her feathers reacted to his touch, to the way his talon-like fingernails grazed the surface of her soft skin which covered the thin wing bones. They fluffed up, and Diaval felt the whole wing tremble so slightly before the feathers settled back. He needed no words to know what kind of sensation coursed through her body. He had been on the receiving end of such stimulations for seventeen years now. Her breathing was deeper and faster, heating the back of his neck, causing him to seriously reconsider his reluctance at initiating more carnal kind of touch. Though, it was doubtful if they were not well into carnal waters already. He was completely hard now. 

Partly on instinct, and partly because he had been dying to do that since the first night his mistress had gotten her wings back, he started to carefully run his talons through her feathers in a preening manner, in which he was a bit of an expert, if he did say so himself. He would have been even more dexterous if he had his beak, but then he wouldn’t have his sensitive fingertips, and he wouldn’t give away those fingertips now for all his wing and tail feathers. (He would, of course, never admit that, not even under the threat of torture. Not after all those years spent complaining to his mistress that he detested his clumsy human form. It was the matter of pride.) His talon-equipped fingertips started expertly running over each contour feather that was within his reach, removing the dust and the occasional shard of glass still embedded there. Lacking the glands he could use to oil the feathers, he settled for caressing them lovingly with his palm. Occasionally, she would fluff them up and shiver, and in those moments her breathing would quicken and her grip on his hand would tighten, and consequently he could feel his nether parts begging for attention, but he wouldn’t stop his sacred mission now. After the coverts, the primaries were in order. He grazed along each and every one of them, drawing them through his talons as he would through his beak, cleaning the dirt and realigning the barbules. Finally, by the time he rolled to lie on his back again to reach for the feathers at the base of her wing, his left arm was numb and cramping, his injury protesting at the effort, but he was barely aware of that. He could finally see her face now, and upon seeing her flushed cheeks and dilated pupils, his hardness became so intense it was painful. 

When he started to work on the junction of her wing with her back- a spot which has only recently been a blackened, scorched bump- when he gently run his talons through the silky downies there, she closed her eyes and moaned. Her body arched against his own, and he stopped, unsure whether to proceed or not. She didn’t sound painful, but with such a sensitive spot, he needed to be careful.

“Is this…is this what I have been doing to you, all these years? When I am…caressing your feathers?” her eyes, when she opened them, were glazed over and a shaky smile was on her lips, and he was certain now. 

“It is, and I’m pretty sure you full well know it, and always did”, he grinned back. “Even if I am only half that successful at driving you mad as you are to me, I will consider this a fair payback.”

“Oh, no”, she ran a hand through his hair, „a fair payback you will have when you recover enough to be…fully functional.” 

But her hips were moving, probably on their own accord, and it was clear as day to him that she would not be able to sleep without a release. Which made him more than a little proud. It also made him more than a little desperate for a release of his own. 

Throwing caution to the wind, he clasped his fingers gently around her arm and tentatively led it down his belly, until he had her touch the tip of his painfully hard organ. “Would my mistress consider this fully functional?”

She shook her head in disbelief. “I should have known. All that effort in spell-casting, potion-brewing and sheep-slaying to make some small amount of blood back into your veins, and immediately you use it to make your lower head work.”

“Well, you should take that as a proud testimony of your skill. You have managed to rise the dead.”

She awarded him with that wide , toothy grin that he adored. “Well, thank you. But still, you are in no condition for any taxing activities. You still hadn’t walked on your two legs without keeling over.”

“An excellent point. I don’t need to be able to walk. In fact, I believe I should absolutely engage in nothing but horizontal activities.”

“Oh, you randy fool”, she shook her head. But her grin was still firmly in place, and she was eyeing him predatorily. She also took his hardness in her hand, giving him a good firm squeeze, which made him suck the air in through gritted teeth. “You do realize you might lose consciousness, do you not?”

He answered by moving his hand between her tights, finding a copious amount of wetness, as anticipated. It was her turn to shiver and breathe through her teeth, eyes closed. 

“Then let me satisfy you, my mistress, while there’s time”, he whispered in her ear. 

Her eyes were stormy with excitement when she looked at him. “Don’t strain”, she warned. “Let me do most of the work this time, you insatiable fool of a bird. And tell me if you are hurting. Is that understood?”

With that, she got to her knees and hands, and then straddled him, still not sheathing him inside her. 

“I will”, he said, trying to diminish some of his arousal by talking, so he wouldn’t be done before her. “But promise me something.”

“Hmmm?” 

“You must let me preen your other wing afterwards.”

Again that beloved, toothed smile. “More payback, hmm?”

“Payback” he agreed. “I have seventeen years of sweet torture for you to atone for.”

He had thought he wouldn’t faint, truly. And he didn’t, when he touched her wetness and found what he was looking for and employed all the dexterity he had worked on so hard over the years to send her over the edge. He didn’t, when he saw shaking her wings violently at her climax, which made the heat in his groins almost enough to send him right after her. He didn’t, when she took him inside herself, her wings magnificently spread apart, and incoherent sounds escaped his throat. But right at the moment before the heat exploded in his lower belly and his spine, he realized his vision field was darkening at the periphery, and colorful stars started to dance before his eyes, and he knew he was about to say goodbye to the world for a short while. But he wasn’t finding it embarrassing now; he was finding it hilarious, knowing he’d hear _‘I told you so, ridiculous bird_ ’ soon enough.

Right before he claims his payback, of course.

Then she arched her body over his, and the sight of her wings shielding him, covering him, engulfing him in their scent, sent him crashing into climax. He had just enough time to ride it through before the darkness started sucking him in. 

But it was well worth it. Which raven before him could ever claim losing consciousness in such a blissful, wonderful way? 

And, of course, when he wakes up, once she’s done reprimanding him and pretending to be harsh, and he’s done pretending to be humble…he will have his payback. 

In the touch of her feathers.


	15. A poke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maleficent is at loss for words when she needs to apologize. So she turns to...other methods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place right at the end of "Heart of the Moors", by Holly Black. There, Maleficent and Diaval have a short squabble, and soon afterwards, she signs a treaty between the Moors and Perceforest in Diaval's blood.

**_“Yes, mistress. No need, by the by, to thank me for bringing Aurora to your rescue”, he said. “No need for me to have freed myself and thought of nothing but coming back here, flying through night and day. No, no need to thank me at all.”_ **   
**_Maleficent gave him a fierce look. “You mean for bringing Aurora straight into danger?”_ **   
**_Aurora left them bickering and knelt beside Phillip._ **

  
\- Heart of the Moors, by Holly Black  
…………………………………………………………

After they left Perceforest behind, Maleficent kept Diaval in his winged horse form until they returned to their tree in the Moors, for more than one reason.

First was because she could tell he liked it, even though she knew he wouldn’t admit it even if his feathered mane had been plucked out feather by feather. His huge raven wings, larger than her own now, were something spectacular to behold, which would of course be a delightful treat to his vanity. As they quietly flew towards their home, he shook his mane proudly every now and then, and she knew she had been right on spot with her choice of his form. And she wanted him to flatter him a little bit, to make him feel good about himself, so he might forget that he had a good reason to be angry with her. Of course, that was something she wouldn’t admit if her own feathers were plucked one by one.

Second was because she was so exhausted, she was afraid she might faint mid-air, and she would need him to catch her. And that was another thing she wouldn’t admit for the life of her, but she felt like he sensed it anyway, because he made a deliberate effort to fly beneath her for the most of their short journey, as if positioning himself to catch her if need be, and kept glancing at her with his large black eyes. She wondered if there would ever come a time she might _not_ need him to catch her when she falters, to be her wings still even though she had her own again, and decided she could not see that happening. 

Which was a frightening thought. 

Just as frightening as wondering if everyone else saw that, too, fairies and humans alike; if it had been as plain as horns on her head, no matter how aloof she tried to be with him in public. And she did try, sometimes to the point of being abrasive and harsh to him, she knew. 

Like she did today.

The clever eyes on his elegant equine face offered no clue to whether he still held it against her. The sound of his wings ruffling below her was calming; their iridescent black gleamed in hues of purple and green, and so did his glossy black back and his feathered mane. He was beautiful, stunningly beautiful in every form she would give him. And she wasn’t trying at all to accomplish that; there was no need. He was innately beautiful, inside and out, and that beauty shone through any shape he might be in. And that accursed bird knew that all too well and prided himself in that fact and knew exactly how to use it so that she would...

Realizing that she was losing altitude, she stirred from what she realized had been the beginnings of exhausted sleep, and flapped her wings in alarm, rising up. She didn’t get far before his huge wings and strong back rose very close to her; almost close enough for his windswept mane to brush over her chest, and she almost yelled at him to stop acting out or they will collide mid-flight, but realized what he wanted her to do. 

“No”, she refused, louder than necessary, even with the wind carrying her voice away.

He snorted impatiently like a true horse, glanced at her with a very humanlike expression in his large eyes, and spread his enormous wings to soar effortlessly like a seasoned bird that he was. Not for the first time, she wondered how was it possible for him to balance all his different forms in one single mind and not to get lost in all those starkly differing urges, sensations and emotions? That miserable storyteller had been a cat for barely a few days, and had already started losing his human identity, she could tell. Had she left him like that, by the end of the year he would hardly even remember he had ever been anything other than a cat. But Diaval remembered everything; felt everything. Was he special in some way? Or had the storyteller been especially weak-minded? Diaval always claimed that the transformations were not hurting him in any way, save occasionally his pride, but had it truly been that way?

Her horse-bird-man companion neighed irritably and almost bumped his back with her chest in a single movement of his wingtips. Unaccustomed to be overpowered and outmaneuvered in air so easily, Maleficent warned angrily: “Do that again, and I will turn you into a slug, right here and now!” 

Diaval shook his rich mane again and snorted. He didn’t need to have words for her to understand him perfectly. _Oh, come on. You rode me before. And I don’t mean only in this form, if I may be blunt, mistress._

It was ‘ _anything you need_ ’ for him still, even if he was cross at her still, and she deserved it. Even if what she needed and what she wanted were two different things. Even with her wings being safely back on her body. Even after all those years. 

That silly bird truly did not know what was best for him. He was exhausted too, she knew; he had spent day and night flying around, bringing the cavalry to her rescue, as he had pointed out earlier. But he was right, curse him. She was much more worse off for wear than him.

“Oh, all right! But only so you would cease trying to crash us both into ground!” 

It was a lie, of course, and she knew that he knew it. But she would take his pretense.

The relief when she eased herself carefully on his back, gripping him by his mane, the feathers of her tired wings rippling in the wind as she folded them on her back once she was safely rested against his body, was so overwhelming it was embarrassing. The smug way his eyes twinkled when he crooked his long neck to meet her eyes made it even worse. 

“Don’t look at me like that. You only won one battle”, she warned him.

Allowing herself to fully feel the effect of having been very recently drugged into unconsciousness, enchained with iron, and drained of her magic by trying to heal Phillip at least so that the boy’s potentially fatal gut wound would become merely a skin-deep nuisance, she sunk into darkness like a stone, engulfed in the warmth of Diaval’s body and the scent of his feathers. 

oOo

The touch of grass beneath her was soft. 

_The Moors_ , she thought, sighing with relief. But something was missing…

She curled herself up in her wings, and another enormous black blanket of feathers shielded her from the crisp night air and whatever curious look she might attract. A huff of warm air tickled her temple. 

_Ah, good_. 

She slept, warm.

oOo

She was awoken by something small and firm colliding with her head. 

Not exactly painful, but not how one would hope to start the day. Irritated instantly even before she opened her eyes, she groaned and pushed herself into a half-seated position, her aching head protesting against the effort and reminding her of her very recent encounter with iron. Whoever was the fool who had decided to play pranks on her on this very morning, she was going to hex them into walking backwards for a week. 

When she finally opened her eyes, she saw a wild pear in the grass in front of her- undoubtedly the weapon of the prankster. 

“Ow!” a surprised yelp escaped her when another fruit landed right on top of her head and rolled into her lap. Furious, she turned around to find the perpetrator, determined to shove both pears into their rear end, and found herself face to face with the big, long snout of a black winged stallion. His mouth was, of course, full of pears- apparently, he had either ravaged some poor farmer’s orchard, or he had gotten on the good side of one of the female tree sentries. His eyes were impatient and he twitched his ears irritably.

 _Get up,_ said one sharp nod of his head.

Maleficent blinked at him furiously to hide how silly she felt, being startled from her sleep so unceremoniously.

“What?” she snapped sharply at his obvious impatience. The answer came in a pile of pears delivered out of his stuffed mouth right into her lap, and she had to remind herself of her pride and dignity to stop herself from kicking them away and squeal like a squeamish girl. “What are you doing?” she yelled angrily instead. 

The winged horse snorted at the pile of slobber-covered fruit which she tried hard not to touch. There was an air of pride about his demeanor, likely because of how good of a provider he was to his mistress, and Maleficent groaned, torn between irritation and endearment. 

Diaval stomped his hoof impatiently at the ground, and Maleficent knew why he was in such a hurry. They had to go back to the castle; the treaty was to be signed at noon, and certainly the silly bird wanted to prepare himself to look his absolute best at his fledgling’s important day. With little luck, he had forgotten the squabble he had with Maleficent yesterday, and she would get away without the…talk.

“Diaval, you cannot possibly think I would eat this. It had been in your _mouth_.”

He pranced around her, anxiously neighing and flapping his wings, in a manner she knew too well from his original and preferred form. Sighing upon the realization that she won’t be able to keep him in any animal form, which meant she was likely looking into a morning filled with tension and arguing, she lifted her hand to change him into a man. 

The winged horse collapsed into a cloud of black mist and rose again as a man, who staggered slightly before adjusting to his new balance distribution. Even as he straightened his loose shirt and his scruffy coat, he wasted no time answering his mistress: “If I were to be a man for a hundred years, or a fey even, I’d never understand you in this. What is so terrible about taking the food from someone else’s mouth? Us birds, we do it all the time. It’s a sign of devotion and care. Even human mothers sometimes chew the food for their small infants. It is the same food that it has been before it was in my mouth, only arguably better now.”

“It has your _saliva_ all over it. “

He shrugged. “You never seemed to mind having other fluids of mine in your- “

“Finish that sentence, and that particular happenstance will remain but a pleasant memory in that perverted brain of yours”, she warned him. He shut up immediately, but continued to shift his weight from one leg to another as he would do as a raven, rubbing his palms together in a manner very similar to Aurora. That girl, Maleficent thought, spent too much time with this irritating bird, if she started picking up his mannerisms. One would think he was her blood father.

 _If only he was_ , a whistful thought emerged as she levitated his offering of pears into the river to wash them. (She could, of course, use magic to clean them, but this was slower and more deliberate and irked him much more, which she considered an equal payment for the rude awakening he had given her.)

To her regret, it didn’t irk him nearly bad enough. He must have been absent- minded and anxious, because he spared the pears one resigned look before taking a deep sigh and climbing up their tree and into their home with learned nimbleness.

Maleficent looked at his black-clad form retreating into their dome-shaped abode, frowning. His lack of acerbic retort might have been due to his preoccupation with the today’s upcoming big event, but she had the sickening feeling that it had more to do with their recent…misunderstanding. 

Her deep sigh mimicking Diaval’s, Maleficent ate the pears, now clean and perfectly fit to eat. She couldn’t help but notice they were all undamaged. He must have been very careful when he was picking them and carried them to her, even with the large teeth and the unfamiliar form he had sported at the time. 

Damnable bird. Why did he have to be so insufferably nice even when he was angry? It would be so much easier to be mad at him if he was rude and loud. As he was, he was completely disarming her.

And she wasn’t feeling any better knowing that he had been, well, perhaps, maybe, a little right. Somehow. 

Her wings carried her into the tree in a heartbeat. She entered through the vines and leaves that covered the entrance to their home with trepidation she wasn’t ready to admit she felt. 

_He has no right to do this to me_ , she thought, angry at herself more than she was at him. _I don’t owe him to humiliate myself by begging for forgiveness. This treaty was my childhood dream, one that cost me dearly, and he has no right making me feel like rubbish on this very day. So I might have judged him a bit wrongly. Too bad. What a fine reason to wrack my nerves before an important event. A spoiled, overindulged creature- that’s what he is._

And yet, when she saw him sitting at the edge of their nest, bare to the waist, fumbling with his shirt like he was seeing it for the first time, she felt her heart falter uncertainly. He was thin as a rail; his skin a collection of scars and markings, and still a bit paler than he had been before the night of the battle. Months had passed since then, and he had only recently achieved the same level of physical endurance he had before his injury. And he was still subtly thinner than he used to be.

_He should have kept some of those bloody pears for himself._

He didn’t bother to look at her when she entered. The lack of his usual warmth made her feel as if she was losing her footing. This, in turn, made her angrier. 

“Did you eat?”, she asked curtly, torn between wanting to throttle him and wanting to force-feed him. 

He eyed her with unusually cryptic look. “Did you spare me any?”

She pressed her lips together, blood rising to her cheeks. No, of course she didn’t. She thought of that too late. She had just assumed he would have taken care of himself first. And now her inquiry, meant to try and mend the gap between them, was turned against her, and used skillfully to make her feel lousy. Only Diaval would know how to turn the tables against her in a blink of an eye.

 _Only those we care for the most ever do. Haven't you learned your lesson already?_ , she thought, furiously glaring at his almost imperceptibly smug expression. 

“See, this is what I’m telling you. If you were a bird, you could feed me now with the food from your crop,”, he said, a hint of a smile on his lips. _Victorious_ smile. 

“You wish to be a bird?”, she retorted angrily and changed him into his regular feathered self before he had time to utter a word. His shirt fell before him in a heap, and he flapped his wings, emitting a series of angry, high-pitched caws at her. Even as a bird, his eyes were accusing. 

“There”, she said coldly. “Now you won’t have to worry how you look for the ceremony.”

The high-pitched caws morphed into deep, guttural croaking. It was fascinating that one creature was capable of such a large range of starkly different vocalizations. He sounded like a growling wolf with a bad case of croup. His feathers were ruffled, hackles raised.

Maleficent would have laughed, if the anguish in his eyes wasn’t all too visible. She had hit him where it hurt, she knew. Because for all his complaining about the horrors of being in a human body, she was well aware there were many things he cherished about it as well. His words, of course, which he loved to use. His expanded mind, the enhanced taste in his mouth, the agility and the sensitivity of his fingers. 

His arms, with which he could hug his fledgling on one of the most important days in her life.

And the fact that he could stand next to them both as an equal. Recognized as a person. As someone relevant in their lives. Not just some extravagant addition to Maleficent’s appearance; a pet, or worse, an ornament.

_I have no right doing this to him._

The thought was so sudden, so clear in her mind, that it was almost forceful, taking her off guard with the amount of guilt that it sent rushing over her. But before she recovered, before she could do anything about it, Diaval hopped to the entrance and rushed out, leaving his crumpled shirt behind, along with his earthy scent. Maleficent didn’t follow.

 _I have no right doing this to him,_ the thought repeated itself, stubbornly. _This is humiliating and depreciating. I have no right._

_Of course I do. He is the one who has no right making me feel bad about some silly little thing that I said. Especially not today. He could have at least left it alone until after the treaty is signed._

_It wasn’t a silly little thing. It was a big thing for him. I accused him of bringing Aurora into danger. It would be a big thing for me, if he said that to me._

_Well, still. One wrong sentence, and so much fuss._

_What fuss? He said nothing. He brought food. He only answered my question._

_He acted as if he’d swallowed a broom. And he should have answered it differently._

_How? Was he supposed to lie that he did eat when he did not?_

_Well, it would certainly make me feel better._

_Enough. He deserves to stand there next to us as an equal, regardless of who is right and who is wrong. I have no right taking that away from him._

_He would have never been able to stand as our equal if not for me! I gave him that right. He has it because of me! I can just as well take it away from him._

_No. No, not just as well. He deserves better, much better. I need to do better by him._

_Perhaps he needs to toughen up a bit._

_And perhaps we could now imagine Aurora’s face when she sees him in his raven shape, when she knows full well he’d want to be a man for this kind of occasion. Perhaps we could imagine the look in her eyes when she hears the reason why is he like that. Perhaps we could imagine her anger, her disappointment._

_Or perhaps, let’s imagine coming back here after the ceremony, and he doesn’t follow._

_Let’s just imagine that for a little while._

The green leaves on the walls made of interwoven branches suddenly started losing their sheen. The air felt stuff and chilly. It was almost like getting surrounded by iron chains again, wrapping around her, slowly. 

She didn’t want to imagine anything anymore. 

oOo

“We are going to be late.”

Of course the raven had to pick the most inaccessible spot in all Moors for him to hide and lick his wounds. He was perched on a small alcove at the cliffs above the river, where the stone was smooth as glass and only a bird or a pixie or a water nymph would be able to sit on one of the small stone jags. Maleficent could only hover before him, but she had nowhere to hold onto, nowhere to perch next to him. There were many places that were better hidden, but few were this seclusive and this impossible for a large fairy to fit in.

“The dozens of Moorlanders are waiting for us!”, she raised her voice, flapping her wings to keep the altitude.

Diaval adjusted his wings, but otherwise remained still. He spared her a glance, and the rare hollowness in that gaze made her shudder in her core.

“Diaval, I swear I am going to...” she trailed off, trying hard to not let her anger get the better of her again. “...Aurora will expect you!” 

It was a desperate measure. When his whole body jerked at the mention of the girl’s name, Maleficent thought she had gotten to him. But he stilled again, looking away. Only his wings, jet-black and glossy, drooped in resignation.

Maleficent glared at him incredulously. “Is that it? You just...give up? What am I supposed to tell her when she asks why are you not there? What do you think how it will look like?”

Now he did turn to eye her, and sharply so. He clicked his sharp, curved beak, bobbed his head and rumbled out a croak, and Maleficent could know exactly what he thought, as clearly as if he’d spoken the words. _‘I wouldn’t know, mistress. I am but a bird. I don’t have to worry about how things look at the ceremony_.’

She beat her wings a bit too strongly and they lifted her higher than she had wanted to be. She had to reign in her strength. Reigning in her nerves was even harder.

The image of her empty nest was constantly in her mind. So were those cursed pears he had brought to her, looking all proud in his winged horse form. So was the last night’s moments when her wings almost faltered, almost, and he lend her his own wings and his own back to carry her home safely. He wasn’t looking proud now. He looked small and humiliated and hurt, chased into a corner, and his wings looked as if they had lost all strength. 

And it was her fault.

 _If he thinks he can outsmart me_... Maleficent released a stream of golden magic, and from the ground, a climbing vine erupted from the ground beneath the cliff. It grew and grew, taller and thicker with every moment, until it reached Diaval’s hiding spot, where it curved itself elegantly, giving Maleficent a comfortable place to perch at. Which she did, pompously. That earned her another dark glare from the raven. She wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d taken off, but he remained on his alcove, steaming silently.

However, now that she had him at her side, she found herself short for words. As usual. 

_It is I who should have been born a bird_ , she thought bitterly. He was so good with words, as if he had been hatched with them. Better than most. Better than her, without any doubt. It wasn’t even a competition. What little words she had planned, deserted her now. Those that remained felt too thick to utter. 

_I am sorry. Forgive me. I love you. I let some of my poison to seep out of me, and the one closest to me got caught in it. You were right. Thank you for still being my wings, my trusted friend, my only friend. For loving me even when I least deserve it. I will try to do better. I can’t promise I will succeed, but I will try. Look at me. Show me that you still want me to change you into a man, to stand by me, side by side._

Try as hard as she might, nothing came out. Diaval stared away from her, the breeze rippling his thick, lustrous feathers. 

_Tell him something. Anything._

She couldn’t.

_Change him into a man!_

The magic felt cold at her fingers. Her hands felt full of lead. With great effort and a rapidly beathing heart, she lifted a finger at him.

And instead of producing a swirl of magic to change him, she poked him in his side with her sharp fingernail.

He let out a surprised “ewk!” and looked at her accusingly and incredulously. There was something comical in his rightful indignation. 

He made a quick, irritated check of the state of his feathers, smoothing out the stray ones with his thick, long beak, and continued to stare in the distance. 

Her mind entirely void of any meaningful, mature and unthreatening way to make him look at her, she poked him in his side again, earning another yelp from him, and this time, a warning peck of that dagger-like beak at the direction of her fingers. She suppressed a smile at his transparent bluff. She knew he’d rather have both his eyes pecked out by crows than drawing a single drop of her blood. 

_And you shouldn’t be taking advantage of that. Where is your courage now, Protector of the Moors?_

Yes, courage. Where this insufferable bird was concerned, she seemed to be in low supply of that. Taking a deep breath to calm her wrecking nerves, she waved her hand, and the black-feathered bird suddenly became a black-haired man, bare to the waist and suddenly too big for his slippery perch. He flailed, panicked only for a fraction of a moment, before Maleficent’s vine caught him, having him sit safely among the leaves next to the fairy.

They weren’t looking at one another. No one spoke for several long moments. Maleficent tried to glance at him without being too obvious, though she didn’t know why she was trying at all. Also, she still didn’t know how to say what she knew that needed to be said, and the tension in her chest was becoming unbearable.

 _I am sorry_.

She poked him in his now-human ribs again. She heard a sharp intake of air, but he didn’t comment.

_Forgive me._

Another sharp jab at his skinny side. She could feel the bone right under the thickness of her nail. 

_I was wrong._

Again, and now he squirmed uncomfortably, but still refused to speak.

_I need you._

She aimed a bit lower, and this time, she poked him right below the ribs. Finally, he exclaimed “OW!” and rubbed his offended side. 

But luckily for his mistress, Diaval didn’t have her ability to mold his face into a waxen mask, regardless of what steamed underneath. For all his offended, stiff demeanor, there was a lopsided smile curving the corner of his lips. She was _getting_ to him. Of course that the raven in him could not resist the mirth that came with the silly escapade to which the mighty and powerful Maleficent of the Moors resorted to. She recalled all the occasions in which he would nip the tails of some unsuspecting creature- a cat, a dog, a hawk (to Maleficent’s horror), a fairy, or the hem of Aurora’s dress, only to jump away when they yelped and squeaked and sprang about, and his croaking would resemble very much the laughter he would made as s human. What she was doing to him now was not much different. Of course he would appreciate the hilarity of it.

Encouraged, Maleficent poked him below the ribs again. 

_What would I do without you?_

And again.

 _I didn’t want to hurt you._

Again- but this time, his bird-fast reflexes had him catching her hand before she managed to pull it away. His fingers curled gently around hers.

“I know”, he said, finally looking at her with all that kindness and understanding that she loved him for, and she froze, thinking that she had managed to speak her thoughts at last. But she didn’t, she knew. And she knew that he wasn’t able to read minds, despite knowing her so well that it often seemed to be the case. Like now. He simply understood her silence. And her poking finger in his side.

“If I let go of your hand, do you promise to stop trying to drill a hole in my body?”

“What use would I have of a raven with a hole in his body? You are petulant enough as it is. To sign the treaty in your blood, maybe?

“Oh, of course. To symbolize your unwavering devotion and esteem for my person, no doubt.”

The sarcasm in his voice was thick like honey, but bitter like wormwood. It made her heart twist in her chest, and as usual, anger was quick to follow.

_He has no right making me feel bad. He has no…_

_Oh, no. Not again. Stop._

She took deep, deep breaths to cool down the ugly fire that flared in her belly, threatening to swallow and burn the tender connection she was trying to weave between them. Diaval was quiet, waiting for her blow.  
She was resolute to refrain herself from making one.  
She caressed the fingers that gently held her hand with her thumb, looking at him intently. _Are we all right now?_

“You hurt me, mistress”, he said quietly, seriously. Without accusation, without anger. Only that overwhelming, resigned sadness.

No, not all right yet, she realized and gripped his hand tighter. Pathetic; she was pathetic. But she couldn’t help the sense of reemerging dread in her belly.

“I would never do anything that would endanger Aurora. Never. I would sooner had my both wings smashed with a dull axe. Yes, I knew I wasn’t leading her on a picnic, exactly. But she knew that too. We took a battalion of soldiers to follow her. And she’s a queen. My queen. Our queen. Not a wee baby we helped raise anymore, mistress. But our queen who needs us to believe in her decisions. How is she going to believe in herself, if we don’t?”

He was talking fast, as if afraid he would choke up before he’s finished, or that she’s cut him off, or both. Every word felt like a blow to her stomach. Anger flared up inside her; her old protector, her greatest enemy. 

“How was I to know you had a whole plan concocted, you two?” Maleficent snarled, but her voice sounded hollow; her bite lacked its sharp edge. “It looked bad; you cannot deny that!”

His expression darkened into a rarely angry, ominous glare. But it lasted only for a moment before morphing again into that heart-wrenching sorrow. Grief, even. His eyes glistened. Maleficent would have preferred anger. For once, just for once, she wanted to see him furious at her, angry beyond control, if nothing then to have an excuse to unleash her own rage at him.

“I have been giving you the benefit of the doubt for seventeen years”, he said hoarsely, slowly pulling his hand from hers. “You wouldn’t show me the same trust for an hour.”

She gaped at him, freezing. Even her anger froze within her. Something weighed at her in the pit of her stomach, so heavily that she felt that her faithful wings wouldn’t be able to carry her if she fell. Oh, how she wished she could find something to counter him, but there was nothing. Everything she felt was untranslatable into words. 

_Be angry. Be furious. Come on. Fight me. Just don’t be so sad, so…_

Diaval shook his head mournfully. His shoulders were slumped. He looked away in the abyss underneath them, not seeing anything. She knew that he was looking away so she wouldn’t see his eyes were full of tears. His breathing was fast and ragged.  
She searched for the right words frantically, but it felt like blindly groping for a slippery fish in a pool of thick mud. She was frozen inside and out; her face- that much she knew- didn’t slip for a moment. 

Only her hand, feeling acutely the loss of his touch, came alive. Her fingers clenched and unclenched, and once again, her sharp fingertip found his ribs. 

_I am so sorry. I should have known better._

Diaval squirmed, and the corner of his mouth did curl so slightly upwards, but the general air of being drenched in tar remained around him. 

Now she aimed for the soft skin underneath his armpits, delivering a decent prod. 

_Let me make it up to you_.

He stirred, twisting like an eel and emitting a half-chuckle, half-yelp. Turning his red-rimmed, large eyes at her at last, he said quietly: “You can’t call back a stone after it’s been thrown, mistress. What is done, is done.”

She waited, silent. The only thing she could do was to make sure that her mask stays firmly in place, so she did exactly that. Not a muscle on her face twitched. 

“Have I not earned your trust yet?” he continued quietly. “After all these years? After everything? Because if I still need to convince you that I am worthy of it, if I still have to beg for it, then I don’t…”

 _“You are the only one I trust, you stupid bird!!!”_

The anger finally broke through layers upon layers of ice in her chest and erupted in her loud, furious exclamation. It was the bitter disappointment in his voice that broke her. If only he would be angry. If only he despised her. Anything would be preferable to the gut-wrenching realization that she had failed him, plain and simple. 

He didn’t even stir. He must have been expecting the explosion the entire time. Blinking slowly, he answered: “Perhaps you do now, in hindsight. But you didn’t trust me enough yesterday, when it mattered. And you didn’t trust me to be enough of a person of my own today, when you denied me of the form you knew I wanted to wear. Of my words and the ability to speak my mind.”

“ _Because you spend half of the time in that form moaning how much you despise it! And because you wasted no time running your mouth about how superior your bird form is compared to my own!”_

Diaval cocked his eyebrow. “So, I am to blame for everything, after all?”

“You are not to blame for _anything_! But that doesn’t mean I won’t tell you that you are, every once in a while!”

He blinked rapidly now, looking at her incredulously. That lopsided grin that she loved so much made a very brief appearance before he bit his lip and shook his head again, looking away. Even knowing him as well as she did, she was uncertain if he was holding back a chuckle or a sob. Perhaps a little bit of both.

“It doesn’t matter”, he said softly. “My mistake. I miscalculated how much you thought of me, in general. Apparently, not as much as I thought. You do call me vain a lot. I suppose…I suppose you are right to do so.”

If only he was being purposefully pouty. If only he was purposefully exaggerating, maliciously, wanting to hurt her. But he wasn’t. 

“Stop that!” she yelled. Now that she had stirred from her stupor, she couldn’t stop. She wanted to take him by his slumped shoulders and shake him like a rag doll. She wanted to slap him across the face, to claw at his scalp, to drag him by the ear over the Moors until she had him in their nest on their tree, and there she would rip his remaining clothes off and take him inside her until she saw him blissfully happy again and they could forget the whole thing. But she knew it wouldn’t work for him. Not in the least.

“We are wasting our time”, he said. He was pale and suddenly looked exhausted. “Aurora shouldn’t wait for the representative of the Moors for the signing of the treaty. It would make her look bad. It might endanger the entire thing.”

He was right. Of course he was. They should hurry. But this was not over. It was anything but over.

Clenching her teeth, she shoved him under his pointy nose the shirt and the scruffy coat he had left behind in their home. She had been clutching them in her fist the whole time. 

“Are you going to show up there half-naked?” she answered his unasked question and arched eyebrows. 

“I was under the impression I was showing up there as a bird.”  
“Put them on, Diaval!!!” 

With a sigh, and with something that Maleficent hoped was smugness and not resignation, Diaval started pulling the black sleeves on his thin arms, black lapels over his scarred skin under which every rib showed. 

But when he finished, a golden glow started to emanate from the old fabric, enveloping him in wisps of magic very different than that of his usual black cloud of shapeshifting. He gasped, watching with wide eyes his clothing changing their usual threadbare appearance. They became smoother, glossier; at the cuffs of his cloak and around his collar, black feathers emerged- familiar, beautiful raven feathers, iridescent in hues of green and purple. 

Diaval’s mouth hung open as he observed his improved state of clothing. He looked at his mistress with disbelief in his eyes. 

“What?” she said flatly. “Why so surprised? If I recall correctly, I did this several times before.”

“Yes, but...”

He trailed away, which made Maleficent perk up considerably. So she wasn’t the only one at loss for words. Good.

“But what? I can’t have my most trusted confidant appearing at this historical event looking like a scarecrow.”

Diaval instinctively ran his hands through his hair, trying to slick it back to be smooth and glossy as his feathers had been. But his human hair was, while silky and fine to touch, also wavy and rebellious and difficult to tame. More and more often, he was letting it to fall around his face as it pleased. Not now, apparently. 

“But…” he caressed the feathers on the cuffs of his sleeves. He appeared dazed with wonder. Maleficent snickered inwardly. She found it downright adorable when he was amazed by her abilities like this. Not to mention that it stroked her confidence. Particularly now, when he couldn’t hide that he was fascinated by her, even after all these years, even now when he was hurt and angry at her.

“Ah, that. Yes. That is a new addition”, she said nonchalantly. In truth, it had been something she had been working on for quite some time, for the occasion like this, to surprise that impossible bird. “Yes, you can stop tugging at them. They are your feathers. Just a speck of magic to bind your clothing to your own plumage. So do refrain from taking that coat off too fast or too rough, or you might hurt yourself.” She looked at him, gauging his reaction. He looked as if he couldn’t believe his eyes. “Is it to your liking?”

“Yes”, he said, licking his lips. She could tell he barely found his voice. “I…thank you, mistress.”

“Should we take our leave now, then?”

His black eyes met her own. There was a whirlwind of emotion there. Maleficent waited, waited for him to decide. She swallowed, but her throat was dry as dust. 

“One thing before we do”, he said at last. “I never thought my raven form better than yours in any way, at any time, past or present. Not even when I had only met you and I had no concept of beauty other than that of a bird.”

“You could have fooled me.”

“Well, I don’t think that it is. And I never have.” He paused. “But that won’t stop me from saying that it is, every once in a while.”

He smiled. A small smile, still dampened with sadness, but a smile nonetheless, still genuine, still sweet and knowing as only he could smile.

Maleficent spread her wings to drive the attention away from her face, so that the sheer relief and the surge of hope wouldn’t be as apparent as she feared they were. For the same reason, her snake-fast hand once again sprang out, her fingernail poking him in his now-clothed side. 

_Thank you. Thank you. Thank you._

He chuckled softly. Yes, the sadness was still clouding his eyes. But she was given another chance to rectify that. And she was determined not to have him regret it.

“Race you to the border”, she announced, let herself fall into the abyss, only to rise again on the updraft like a giant eagle, and picking up speed with every heartbeat.

“Mistress!” she heard him call. “Mistress! I am still- _kraaaa_!”

She didn’t even have to be familiar with his raven vocalizations to know he was complaining furiously at the unfair start she’d granted herself. He was already hot on her heels, making up for the size of his wings with sheer skill and determination. 

Her laughter rang alongside his shrill calls of excitement as they approached the border, where many of the fair folk waited eagerly for them to lead them to their queen.

oOo

Diaval looked proud, standing next to his mistress in his glossy black coat. Of course, his eyes glistened with proud tears every now and then, seeing his fledgling in her magnificent golden attire, standing like a queen that she was, capturing the rapt attention of everyone assembled, humans and fairies alike. 

Listening to Aurora’s speech, Maleficent had to admit that Diaval had the point. Aurora was no longer a little child. These few months transmorphed her. It was difficult to imagine that only six months ago, she was sneaking out to the Moors at nights so that her silly aunties wouldn’t notice. She was a queen- a righteous, strong willed queen, and trying to exclude her from anything important would be a terrible insult not only to her heart, or her intelligence, but also her station. She was a queen, for better or worse, and the responsibility for her actions was hers, and hers only. 

_You can’t call back a stone after it’s been thrown_.

“Let us sign this treaty and agree to be good neighbors to one another”, queen Aurora finished.

_But I can throw another stone. A better one. See if it moves the one I had thrown before._

Maleficent didn’t waste any time. As it was the most usual thing in the world, she reached for Diaval’s cuff and plucked one long feather. He yelped, and before his confusion had the time to settle into offended insult, Maleficent was already signing the treaty. With his feather. His blood. 

The poor scribe, finding himself and his ink and quill unnecessary, was looking quite taken aback, and a little bit queasy. 

_To symbolize my unwavering devotion and esteem for your person, in case you wonder, you insufferable peacock,_ she thought, catching Diaval’s eye and sending him the tiniest smile she could afford in such a serious moment. His eyes grew impossibly large, and his trademark warmth blossomed in them like embers rekindling. Volumes of unspoken words flowed between them; confessions and apologies and forgiveness, all as loud and clear as if they spoke it aloud, all in a single heartbeat; all in the midst of a room full of people, yet nobody noticing but the two of them.

Aurora glanced at him, but from what Maleficent could see, the wordless exchange between her godmother and her birdfather escaped her notice. Good. The fairy wasn’t keen on having yet another argument with the girl on the topic of their peculiar relationship. 

And while Maleficent spoke of pledging, on the behalf of all Moorlanders, on not souring anyone’s milk and not stealing anyone’s children, she wondered if Diaval knew that signing a promise with the loved one’s blood was much more than only a symbol to a fairy. That the act had its implications, magical in nature, and that blood magic was strong, serious and binding. That she didn’t regret it in the least; that she would sign a thousand contracts with his blood, no matter how strongly that would bind her to her words, because she trusted the forces that arose from their bond more than she trusted her own innate magic. Did he know? Should she tell him? 

Perhaps later. Or some other time. The look in his eyes, warm and black as coal, was burning her in the most reassuring way ever, and she knew without a doubt, without a single word exchanged, that she had been forgiven, again. 

_I don’t deserve you, you silly bird_.

But she had decided before she would make it up to him. And his flattering clothes and her promise in blood were only the beginning. At the end of the day, when they are back home, alone, she intended to be much more particular. 

If she doesn’t lose her courage.

After Nanny Stout and Aurora had both signed the treaty, maleficent stepped back to stand next to the still-smitten raven-man. She could tell he no longer saw or heard anything or anybody around them. His entire attention was on her. It was the exact kind of look that was making her heart skip a beat. Not to mention what it did to other parts of her body.

“You didn’t have to do that, mistress”, he whispered in her ear, so close that his breath tickled her neck. It took her a considerable amount of willpower not to grab him and hold him and run her lips over his neck and her fingernails over his back. Or at least to embrace him. But she had the reputation to keep, so she remained stone-faced and unmoving. 

Well, mostly unmoving. Standing so close to him, shielding them slightly with her wing, she let one thin finger to spring out and jab him in his side. Again.

 _I know, you silly bird. But I wanted to_. 

He chuckled in that throaty, raspy way of his, and she knew he understood her. 

“I appreciate this new way of communication”, he whispered secretively, smiling. “Finally, you are learning the fine art of a raven pecking signs. But I do have one request.”

“Oh?”

“Could you provide me with a dagger-proof vest? I was thinking silver.”

oOo

The moment they landed back on their tree, Maleficent beckoned the raven to follow her inside.

The moment they were inside, she magicked the entrance to their home closed, and her companion once again back into the form of a man. 

The moment he was a man before her, she released his clothing of the spell which was binding it to his feathers, and once again he was in his ordinary loose shirt and his everyday scruffy coat. She thought he’d lament the loss of his fine attire, but he didn’t. The moment he was able to take it off, he shed the coat away, letting it to carelessly fall to the floor. 

He didn’t need to ask her what she wanted, because she was quick to take off her cloak and made short work of unbinding her hair, letting it fall messily over her shoulders and back. Neither of them said a word; they were both breathing fast and shallow, the need to physically solidify their reconciliation overwhelming and urgent. 

Uncharacteristically, but not unexpectedly, he moved first, reaching for her face and gently caressing her sharp cheekbones with his thumbs. She was usually the one to initiate the first touch, but whenever they would have a disagreement for which she was mostly to blame- which was, if she was to be fair, more often than the other way around- he would reach out and touch her first to initiate the physical intercourse, and she would put an extra effort to have him enjoy their mating as much and as long as possible. It was another way she spoke to him with her touch when words were nowhere to be found. 

But now, with his face inches away from hers, she wanted to show him what she could not say with something she had been too afraid to do before. Even now, after almost twenty years of company so intimate that she felt that Diaval was a part of herself, and she of him, she was frightened. 

But she wanted it. Oh, how she wanted it. She wanted it for quite some time. She wanted it probably before she was aware of that want, but she became aware of it the night after their return to the Moors, after the battle, when she heard right from his mouth that he wanted to stay, even with his life debt paid; that he had always been with her because he had wanted it, that his life was his choice, and not the whim of the fates, or of a certain ill-tempered fairy.

She had wanted it for so long, but she had only managed to gather the courage now. 

“Wait”, she took hold of his hands, which had moved from her face down her neck, and were gently pulling the wide neckline of her dress down her shoulders. He stopped immediately, his eyes pleading and desperate. She would tease him for his almost comical expression, if she hadn’t been terrified.

“Close your eyes”, she whispered, taking her turn to cup his face in both her palms. He obliged, trusting her completely. Her heart was beating so fast and hard that her ears were ringing. 

Drawing her courage from the sight of his closed eyes, his black eyelashes, the touch of the markings on his temples, she took a deep breath and did what had cost her of her wings the last time she had done it; what she had sworn to herself she would never do again. 

She touched his lips with her own, pressing a tentative, feather-light kiss there.

She felt his entire body going rigid with shock. He had stopped breathing. So did she. His eyes were still closed. He was probably too frightened to open them. She could feel his heartbeat, as rapid as her own, on his temples underneath her palms. She was shaking all over.

She kissed him again. A little bit harder this time. She could taste his lips now; there was a hint of wine he had drank at the castle. She felt lightheaded. His lips parted to speak against her own, his voice low and hoarse and shaking: “Mistress, you don’t...you don’t have to...”

Another sharp jab in the side told him all he needed to know _. I never do anything because I have to, silly bird._

He inhaled sharply, chuckling. Their noses were touching, and he rubbed his pointy tip against the bridge of her nose. As by magic, that childish little touch took away most of her fear, and all of the remaining uncertainty. She started to breathe again, deeply, and allowed herself a short, gleeful giggle- the most undignified of sounds, which she would make absolutely certain never escapes her anyplace other than here, in the safety of her home and her lover’s arms. 

“I’m not certain I’m doing this properly, I’m afraid”, he said, smoothing her hair back with both of his hands, his lips close to hers. He was breathing again, too, and still battling his own insecurity and clumsiness. He was trembling harder than she had, now. 

“Am I?” she frowned, earning a smile from him. “Let’s learn together.”

Bolder now, elated, relieved of her fear, liberated, ecstatic, she held him closer and wrapped her wings around him. He embraced her and offered his lips again, hesitantly brushing them against her own, and this time she was eager to gently taste his bottom lip, to run the tip of her tongue over it, to taste him when he mimicked her and their tongues met. He moaned in a familiar way, and the onslaught of hotness in her lower belly had her grinding against him in urgent desperation. He had been in heat since the moment she had changed him into a man when they got here, but now he was so hard she knew he was hurting. And she was burning. 

Within moments, she was out of her dress, and he was out of his shirt and trousers and boots, and they were in their nest, and he put those fast-learning lips into further good use down her body, lower and lower, until he had her writhing and laughing and moaning and wondering what on earth had she been so foolishly afraid of, for such an unholy amount of time.

oOo

Healing the scratches and bites on Diaval’s skin- some happening accidentally during her climax, some during his, and some because he pleaded for it- Maleficent wondered why did she bother hiding them away for their mating sessions, when she knew that the sounds they were making were likely heard by one-third of the population of the Moors. On top of that, fair folk held much fewer inhibitions and limitations concerning their physical relations then humans did. Seeing a couple of water sprites, hedgehog fairies or foxkin in a heated clinch was an everyday occurrence. And Diaval was about as chaste as any average raven. So, why bother?

Reputation, of course. Because she was Maleficent, the Protector of the Moors. She was mighty, powerful Maleficent, cold and cruel and unfeeling, and how could she allow herself being seen in such a vulnerable, intimate moment? 

Well, she could. She could, if Diaval had meant nothing to her. If it had only been nothing but another demonstration of her power. If he had wanted nothing but to couple with her, and if she would offer him that and nothing more, taking just as much. Then, she would ride him on the top of the highest cliff, for all the Moors to see. 

But as it was, it would be like showing them all her heart, ripped out of her chest and bleeding. And that she would not have. 

She only hoped that Diaval understood that. Because it was not in his nature. From his seemingly off-handed, accidental remarks, she gathered that ravens took great pride in their mates; showing the physical connection was showing to all others how much they cherished their partner. Also, it meant marking their mate- and themselves- to belong to one another. She could see how he might interpret her un-ravenlike behavior as being ashamed of him.

At this moment, thankfully, he didn’t seem to be bothered by such thoughts. He was running his talons through the feathers on her wing, as he did often, every evening before sleep, always after mating. Huddled in their nest, wrapped in her feathers, lying side by side, Diaval still not quite recovered from his post-climactic bliss, they were once again safe in their little world, safe in the trust they shared, all transgressions and misunderstandings smoothed out and forgiven.

Every now and then, Diaval would hesitantly trace her lips with his own, still in disbelief that he was allowed that at long last, and she would pull him in for a hungry, long kiss. The crafty raven had gotten quite proficient in kissing within merely an hour, learning with frightening accuracy the skill which was completely foreign to his ancestry.

“You should eat more”, she frowned, running her hand over his prominent ribcage. 

“Mistress, I eat everything in sight. Literally. Poor Phillip still haven’t recovered from sharing that mouse with me.”

“And yet you look like you wouldn’t last the winter without the generous provisions of a certain wicked fairy.”

“Pfft. The said wicked fairy hardly has a place to talk of that particular matter.” He ran his own hand over her bony shoulders, thin waist, jutting hip bone. “If you were any thinner, I would likely impale myself on your tailbone in my sleep.”

“Oh, would you now? Well, if my physique isn’t pleasing for your excellency, there are always those sad remains of a nest for you to sleep in.” 

Diaval eyed his former place of sleep above their heads, where he used to spend his nights in his raven shape. Ever since Aurora’s sixteenth birthday, and everything that happened that night, Diaval hadn’t spent a single night there. Be it in his human or his raven form, he slept regularly with his mistress ever since. At first, she claimed that was because she couldn’t transform him back into a bird without the risk for his health, which had been true, but even after he had recuperated, he simply...stayed. And she didn’t object. 

“Ah, that”, he said smugly. When he looked back at her, his eyes were mischievous and warm. “Remember when you told me it was only that one time? Me in your nest?”

She poked him in his scrawny side with her fingernail, making him squeak with both pain and laughter, wiggling out of the cover of her feathers. “Oh, hush, you incorrigible bird. Keep talking, and you might find yourself sleeping out on that lovely northern wind.”

And she covered him with her wing again, because the air was indeed getting colder, and she feared that the fool of a bird-man might hesitate to tell her he was chilled so he wouldn’t bother her. To which he gave her his silly lopsided grin and huddled closer to her.

“That’s better”, she approved, resting her hand on his rather small, rather lovely bottom. 

“I hardly think you would get rid of such a reasonably priced bed-warmer", he muttered from under her wing. “I am almost shamefully cheap. Some new clothes, some wine, a bit of celebrating, and you have me entirely under your wing. In every way imaginable.”

Maleficent paused, heart starting to beat faster again. He had just given her a perfect opportunity for another thing she wanted to do, another way to show him now, in the safety of their sanctuary, how much he meant to her, when she couldn’t have the gumption to do it as much and as often and as publicly as he deserved...but again, how to start? What to say? 

“Mistress?” Diaval peeked under her wing in alarm. “What is wrong?”

“Nothing!” she said, a bit too fast, a bit too harsh.

He shook his head, frowning. “Don’t start. Your heart is going like mad! Are you all right? Are you in pain? Did I...did I hurt you?”

She pinched the bridge of her nose. Did he have to notice everything? 

“No, Diaval, you nagging old bird. You did not hurt me. And nothing is wrong.”

“Old”, he grumbled. “Look who’s talking now. If you didn’t know, my great- great- grandparents had only just been hatched when you were already rampaging across the Moors with Robin. And I might have omitted a few ‘greats’.”

But he put his hand over her chest, between her breasts, as if trying to calm her raging heart with his touch. His eyes were wide and panicked. She had to do it now, however it turned out.

“I wanted to give you something. If you would have it, of course.” 

He watched with puzzled expression as she rose to her feet to fetch something from her hiding place, which appeared in the wall with one wave of her hand. Suddenly left without the protection of her wing, he shuddered and rubbed his arms as he sat on the edge of the nest, waiting. 

She turned back to him, clutching the item in her fist. But she couldn’t just drop it in his lap. She had to say something. She had to at least try. And she had to hurry, because by this point, he appeared genuinely terrified of what was she going to face him with. Her sudden stiff demeanor probably wasn’t helping.

“Remember when you were recuperating here, after the battle?”

He nodded, watching her closely.

“You said that...you didn’t wish to be...elsewhere.”

He nodded again. His eyes widened further. He rose to his feet as well, so they were facing each other, naked. 

“And I am...not displeased. In fact, it is the exact opposite. Opposite of displeased.”

She pinched the bridge of her nose again so she wouldn’t have to see his amused expression at her awkward attempts to express herself while still clutching to her dignity. 

“I understand”, he said softly. He did sound understanding. 

“But do you understand that...” she cleared her throat. “I am what I am, how I am. And I don’t know if I will ever change.”

He tilted his head, utterly confused. “Change? Why on earth would you change? What is there to change?”

She smiled mournfully. “I am not exactly a raven’s dream mate, now am I, Diaval?” 

This seemed to only confuse him further. “What?”

“Don’t try to tell me I always make you happy with how I am”, she snarled. “Don’t tell me I haven’t given you enough grief to last you a lifetime. Don’t tell me you don’t wish that...that I acted differently with you when we are out, or...that I don’t insist that we are discreet about...that I wasn’t open with what we...I refused to even admit to Aurora, and I don’t know if I will...”

Hearing full well how incoherent she sounded, but being entirely incapable of organizing her words into how she wished them to be, she went quiet. It was pointless. She would never be able to explain it. It was silly of her to try at all. Embarrassed, she looked past his shoulder, swallowing hard.

“Well, of course you sometimes give me grief”, he said, shaking his head incredulously. “Everybody gives grief to other people from time to time. Even a charming lad like me. It’s given when you live in an unkindness. Squabbles happen. We care, we fight, we make it right, we learn and move on.”

She grinned stiffly. “Is that some kind of raven wisdom philosophy?”

“Not at all, just a simple fact.”

She shook her head. “It is more than just that. One day, you might open your eyes and realize...that you are sick of living in...in hiding. Hiding, when you deserve someone...” she swallowed again. It felt like coughing up shards of glass. “...braver. Someone who is not...”, another heavy pause, “...afraid...to speak how they feel. Exactly how they feel. For all the...all the world to hear.”

“Mistress”, Diaval almost moaned, his face carrying expression of someone who had just been flogged.

“For goodness’ sake, stop. I don’t know what came over you now, but...no. Just no. I mean, yes. I mean, no. No, I will not just wake up and decide I want to trade all we have built for someone who is not you. And yes, there are things I wish we could do differently, but those are a ridiculously small price to pay for everything you are giving to me.”

“Clothing?”

“That too”, he smiled, cautiously reaching out to place one hand on her rigid shoulder. His palms, as always, were rough on the surface, but the touch itself was only tenderness. “Let’s put it this way. If I spend the rest of my days at your side, exactly as we are, nothing ever having changed, I am going to die a happy raven.”

“Be careful what you wish for”, she said quietly, looking him straight in the eye. “Because it might come true. I don’t know if I will ever be able to tell you the words you deserve. Or to hold you in my arms for everyone to see, like mates are...”

“Don’t”, he cut her off resolutely. “Or I might start listing out all the things I know you are not happy about me, and we both know I might start crying if we do that, and then we will have a rightful mess.” He sighed. “Mistress, I’m not claiming to be any expert, but from little that I do know or feel, I say there are no perfect relationships. Only those that people work hard for in order to make them succeed. There's a good reason why true love doesn’t come from first sight, you know?”

“What happened to ‘happy’ in ‘happily ever after’?”  
He snorted. “Define ‘happy’. But let’s not make it equal to ‘boring to death and entirely unchallenging.’” 

“Oh, so I am a mere challenge to you, now?”

“An everlasting source of perpetual titillation to my soul.”

She had to admit herself that she was impressed. “Wherever do you find inspiration for ridiculous poppycock like this, and do you ever grow tired of it?”

He shrugged and grinned. “I have no idea. When I’m panicked, it just keeps coming. Like sneezing, but with words. It’s kind of a nice feeling, really, but I can’t control it much.”

“So I see.” 

“My point is”, he grazed the line of her jaw with his talons, like she did to him many times, “we are all faulty, in our own way. But there’s nobody else I would rather be faulty with, my dear, dear mistress.”

The honesty in his voice and the intensity with which he was looking at her made her close her eyes. It was like staring into sun. 

“I might always stay faulty this way, Diaval”, she whispered when she finally opened her eyes. Her chin was held high; her eyes burned.

“Good. Then I’ll always have something to complain about.” 

She looked at him for one moment, two, ten. 

“I just might take you at your word”, she smiled, making sure it looked sinister. As expected, he laughed at her gloomy expression.

“Hold out your hand, then.”

He did, curiosity obvious in his eyes. She took him by the hand. In her other palm, a ring made appearance. Her ring, crafted from the skull of one of Diaval’s kin, which she knew he held to be something precious (he never understood the human and fair folk’s need to remove their kin’s bones away from sight, even to bury them in the dirt- in his opinion, that was disrespect, plain and simple), and she had molded it into a ring of onyx and carried it and cherished it- another of her wordless displays of her affection, and one of her less subtle ones. 

“It has probably come to your attention that a custom exists which involves the bestowing of rings.”

With that, she slipped the ring on his finger, immediately magicking it to accommodate the larger girth. She tried to steady her hand, which trembled slightly, and was grateful that at least her voice didn’t quiver. 

The expression on his face was very similar to the one he had when she used his blood to sign the treaty. She looked down at his hand, then at her eyes, as if trying to figure out if she was pulling a prank on him. When he found no mischief, he opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. His eyes were quickly welling up. And something must have gotten in her eyes as well, because the world had become rather...watery. 

“Mistress, but I...I don’t have...”

He sounded like a water sprite on a hot dry stone. She interlaced her fingers with his own, smiling with all her teeth. “Oh, don’t worry about that. You have piled up such a heap of tra... treasures for me over the years, it more than equals a single ring.”

“Heh. I suppose I did”, he nodded proudly, yet absently. Again, his gaze made her feel like she was looking into the sun, but it didn’t burn. It warmed her; warmed her to the core, even to the ever-aching roots of her once severed wings. A tear ran down his cheek and she quickly wiped it away. 

Slowly, gently, his arms came around her and pulled her in a long, long embrace, which she readily gave back. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, and she felt warm moisture there. She leaned her cheek at his shoulder, ever mindful of her horns and their proximity to his face; feeling lighter than a butterfly; lighter than she had felt since she had been a young girl; lighter than a warm headwind they both loved to soar on. 

_For better or worse, then, you foolish bird_ , she thought and gave his side a gentle poke.

This time, however, the answer came in a tickling jab of his thick talon right under her armpit, and she stirred, barely choking back a throaty laughter. 

_For better or worse, my dear mistress. Though I recall I pretty much promised that once before, and it still stands._

“I’ve just remembered another custom”, she whispered and kissed him on the lips. He returned the kiss, sweet and clumsy and reverent, and their tears mixed in the touch of their faces.

She will have to consider getting him that silver vest after all.


End file.
